Pinching Thighs and Belly Rubs

I use to be angry at my body

Saddened into a spell of rage that my belly wasn’t flat like the girls in the magazines

Upset that I couldn't be, remain thin- una flakita

Depending on my day it would puff out

Holding, marinating with secrets that had been brewing

Stories in waiting for me to unravel

I use to stare at "it" this belly, my body?

Every morning in front of my bathroom’s full body oval mirror

Pushing, pulling, tucking it into where I hoped to get it someday

Memories ...

Mistreatment is what I recall

When I was young my father would wrap his hand around my leg telling me to remain small

Fear is what I gathered before visits to my mother's home

The pinching , micro-managing of my appetite, the not eating...

I prayed that the many parts of this body was invisible to her eye- enough for the world

On visits she would pinch my inner thighs, stare at my body, analyze the "it."

"Don't gain too much weight, it doesn't look good on you," she would say.

I often wondered, "Did I pass the test?"

Now in my bathroom, I have only a medicine cabinet mirror

Only my face is seen

I've been learning how to touch my belly

Checking in with her without the judgments of "should"

I have been rubbing her roundness

crying in my bed

on the grass

in my hammock from all the years of self inflection

patterns of mistreatment

Now, I read books, journal with her, and bring breath to her through the practice of yoga

I place stones around her in the evening

Rose quartz, Moonstone, Red Jasper, Unikite- However Spirit guides me to assist her

I place stones because I am still unsure of love and how to love her without the heavy strikes of hurt

she, they-almost me

Reclaiming the distant, this, that, she, her and crossing the bridge into embrace of me, I, WE.