perhaps scandalous
a reflection on my journey with the somatics of writing and pursuing authenticity as an artist.
I exist in a body that is both strong and frail. She has birthed three children and survived a hundred types of violence done to her. She has forgiven me for the days I wished my skin was lighter. She has held me up despite the chronic pain of arthritis knees and atrophied muscles. Her heart has palpitated her breathing strained and yet she continues on. She has cracked like desert floor and begged for the baptism of radical self love. She has held me in my darkest moments and bled in all the days I couldn’t bare to exist. She has disappointed me and renewed my hope. My will and sense of self has been reincarnated with her. My body is incredible.
I’m very tired of the body being a battlefield.
We live so much of our lives being gaslit and told that our bodies aren’t political. They are. Every day our bodies are a tool to justify violence or demand justice. We live in the battlefield.
We live so much of our lives ignoring our bodies. Fighting them. Trying to fit into a standard made to torture us. Every day we are on a journey of fleeing objectification and coming home to ourselves. The battlefield is inside of us.
This is my body, to be given up for who…?
I’ve been asking myself this question lately. In the past few days my body has shifted in new ways, and created new routines of alarm. My automatic settings used to be “just get through it” as I denied the ways I was in pain. Now I rest and take my time… or at least I try to. My body is begging me to take it easy, to be slow, to listen.
Love exists in the spaces where we listen and I am listening to her more and more.
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