Taught to carry on
Always carry on
Rest is for the weak
Giving up is for those who have no backbone
So you bend forward
Touch the floor with your forehead
to please
Then bend inward
Crushing your heart
Stiffling your soul
Because what you needed was inconsequential
You did this for years
Mastered the game for others
Alienating all the versions of you
Until you walked through a long winded hallway
And a mirror reflected a version of you
So mangled
You do not recognize the eyes that stared back at you
You
But not really
It’s all of them
For them
Always for them
In a spark of revolution
An insurmountable repulsion
You spat at the reflection
Anger needed to be released
To give space to something else
Pieces fell down
The crashing sound was not that scary after all
Anger and shattered glass felt right
Tiptoeing on the shards
To collect or to throw
You picked up a piece that once reflected your face
Freckles and paleness
A beautiful conundrum of acceptance and othering
One
Another angular piece reflecting you wavy hair
Once tamed by chemicals to be accepted as beautiful now carries stories of women who lived before you
Untamable and resourceful
Two
This shard was tiny
But her eyes were mad
She was forgotten but now clearly reflected
She stared back and demanded to be recognized
You picked that tiny piece
And slowly gathered
Them
They
Because all the shards were all yours
You decide which ones take the center of the mosaic
Not them
You
You decided
You
And when the mosaic held
Your fingerprints across every shard
Your ancestors hummed in the quiet
Not with pride
But with recognition
Because you had done
What they were never allowed to do
You chose the pieces
You chose the shape
You chose the life
Softness intact
Steel awakened
You, whole
At last.
***
I caught myself writing poetry again.
The kind that never rhymes,
the kind that makes me wonder if it’s even poetry at all.
But maybe poetry isn’t about rhyme — maybe it’s about truth breaking loose in whatever shape it needs.
So here is one of those pieces.
One that arrived uninvited, but insisted on being written.
In the middle of the chaos, at a hospital reception hall.
ThereseChristensen 