writing

From the dirt she rose with no expectations because she knew they would place those on her.

She has a history, a past, a whole life… but that doesn’t matter.

What matters is what they can make her mean.

What matters is how easily she can be rewritten.

So she learns to stand still enough to be mistaken for earth again.

They do not ask what she remembers.

They only ask what she can hold without speaking.

She becomes a surface.

A standing thing.

A monolith mistaken for silence.

But inside her is not silence.

It is accumulation.

It is weather.

It is everything they refused to see made dense enough to stand upright.

Her bones contain rings, but they will not see them until they decide they are done with her - they only open what they refused to understand while it was still alive.

Water stirs inside of her.

Blood billows through her veins.

Her heart pumps.

Bubbling- all at once,
but to their untrained eyes she remains still.

What moves beneath her surface exists without permission.

Lie down.

Close your eyes.

Ask yourself: bitch you okay?

Answer honestly.

Refuse the role of the savior, sidekick, spectacle.

Refuse their kiss, their glass coffin, their resurrection.

Those things won’t do you any good.

Remember that.

Press your breath into your ribs,

your hips into the surface beneath you.

Mirror the princess until the lie they sold you bends and warps.

Inhale into the space between you and her.

Become a silhouette.

Try not to tremble.

Exhale slowly.

Let your breath stain the image

until she disappears.

Create an image of your own.