Milk and Honey (8 page)

you are in the habit
of co-depending
on people to
make up for what
you think you lack
who tricked you
into believing
another person
was meant to complete you
when the most they can do is complement

do not look for healing
at the feet of those
who broke you

if you were born with
the weakness to fall
you were born with
the strength to rise

perhaps the saddest of all
are those who live waiting
for someone they’re not
sure exists

- 7 billion people

stay strong through your pain
grow flowers from it
you have helped me
grow flowers out of mine so
bloom beautifully
dangerously
loudly
bloom softly
however you need
just bloom

- to the reader

i thank the universe
for taking
everything it has taken
and giving to me
everything it is giving

- balance

it takes grace
to remain kind
in cruel situations

fall
in love
with your solitude

there is a difference between
someone telling you
they love you and
them actually
loving you

sometimes
the apology
never comes
when it is wanted
and when it comes
it is neither wanted
nor needed

- you are too late

you tell me
i am not like most girls
and learn to kiss me with your eyes closed
something about the phrase—something about
how i have to be unlike the women
i call sisters in order to be wanted
makes me want to spit your tongue out
like i am supposed to be proud you picked me
as if i should be relieved you think
i am better than them

the next time he
points out the
hair on your legs is
growing back remind
that boy your body
is not his home
he is a guest
warn him to
never outstep
his welcome
again

to be
soft
is
to be
powerful

you deserve to be
completely found
in your surroundings
not lost within them

i know it’s hard
believe me
i know it feels like
tomorrow will never come
and today will be the most
difficult day to get through
but i swear you will get through
the hurt will pass
as it always does
if you give it time and
let it so let it
go
slowly
like a broken promise
let it go

i like the way the stretch marks
on my thighs look human and
that we’re so soft yet
rough and jungle wild
when we need to be
i love that about us
how capable we are of feeling
how unafraid we are of breaking
and tend to our wounds with grace
just being a woman
calling myself
a woman
makes me utterly whole
and complete

my issue with what they consider beautiful
is their concept of beauty
centers around excluding people
i find hair beautiful
when a woman wears it
like a garden on her skin
that is the definition of beauty
big hooked noses
pointing upward to the sky
like they’re rising
to the occasion
skin the color of earth
my ancestors planted crops on
to feed a lineage of women with
thighs thick as tree trunks
eyes like almonds
deeply hooded with conviction
the rivers of punjab
flow through my bloodstream so
don’t tell me my women
aren’t as beautiful
as the ones in
your country

our backs
tell stories
no books have
the spine to
carry

- women of color

accept yourself
as you were designed

your body
is a museum
of natural disasters
can you grasp how
stunning that is

losing you
was the becoming
of myself

other women’s bodies
are not our battlegrounds