The (Not So) Gentle Parts: a Poem

You talk of your soul ossifying –
the soft parts hardening,
but I’m preoccupied with
pulling out the hems of reality,
ripping out the stitching.

I refuse to yield.

To be soft for too many years
means
to decay,
to become moss underfoot
& I refuse to become trampled.

They told me that the way you identify
lace is by its holes,
and I know now,
I never want to be recognized
by what I lack.

Instead,
I hunt for the parts of myself
that used to be consumed by the patriarchy
and men with hunger for eyes.
(The pieces of myself
that were consumed
because I swallowed my teeth
to make myself more digestible.)

But I don’t need a flashlight
or a search party —
I can be discovered quite easily.

I’m not the girl who I thought I was.
I’m the woman who refuses to surrender.
I forget my fight sometimes
(like the candle who neglected her flame),
but I am prepared for war.

I am no longer paraffin wax that pours down smoothly-
only to harden on your lungs.
I’m not the gentle pieces you stepped upon –
the dandelion you crushed & never asked
forgiveness of.

Isabelle Palerma