I

My knees don’t walk like they used to,

like when I used to bound up the stairs.

Long legs by two steps,

feet shaking the earth.

Ancestors under me, necks curled in reverse.

In one life I longed to sway my hips,

feel my weight slosh from side to side;

to feel I could wear my hips

like they belonged to this body,

what a crime.

Do my knees hold the frequency of rage?

Unsung sorrows?

Does my heart know the yearning for tomorrow

is the passing of today,

is better spent, better used, licking my wounds

and making myself laugh?

Living like I am the wind?

II

There's a numbness that encouraged me to abandon life.

A numbness that exists within it.

It's collective.

It's protective.

A halting sensation–

survival, it's only occupation.

Numbness, a diminishing return:

to avoid the trauma is to be met in the grips of the beast.

She wants to be seen.

Yes, she wants to be seen.

To let the knees speak

would mean to let them scream.

To let the hips breathe

would mean to let them see.

It's the hips that always see, you see.

III

I've circumvented reality,

living out of body.

Though nothing is ever fruitless,

the pain holds its stories.

Recurring eye infections say

"I've been meaning to cry; I'll get to it."

And the Yoni will never fake her arousal.

Does the love with another nourish?

Honor?

Allow her feel seen?

Yes, she wants to feel seen.

Oh, she lives to feel seen.

Belly bloated with desire will say

desire is not a hole one can fill with food

or the crust of the world.

Desire is an all or nothing, live or be muted

approach to life.

IV

If life loves me

simply because I woke up today,

maybe I could challenge my surrender

and ask for a lesson in softening,

for a body in pain

is a soul clung in grasp.

It is life or the self and

someone wants not to let go.

If life loves me

like I love myself,

like I love the sun,

perhaps an ungrasp

would be like sweet rain

on my hot skin–

my melanin,

burnt,

sacred

with rage.