how many things can happen
in just one year
to the body of a woman
who’s becoming a grown-up
plenty of things can go
both well and badly
balancing on a rope
between eternal and karmic
chasing aurora
cracking a rib
few northern lights
and then hell begins
in just one year
a body can go
through hell called rape
lock down its doors
the longest night
it can survive
with nicotine diet
soothing new scars
a body can be
exposed to many
reliving that hell
hoping to tame it
the sea can calm it
sunlight on eyelids
concert of waves
never got justice
the same one year
unplanned and weirdly
a body can feel
warmth of a new skin
poetry readings
facing deep cracks
not realising
some will come back
a body can be
basked in fake love
with silk pink scarf
getting ripped off
unbearable sadness
covered with new feelings
sex on a highway
was it ever even freeing?
disrespected again
it can crack once more
ending up alone
not knowing where to go
on a dusty road
miles and miles away
carrying shoes in one hand
broken heart in the chest
this was just a half
of a woman’s year
trapping herself sadly
chaining her own hands
when there is no place lower
a body might quite fast
lose a little skin
reveal its structured parts
it can take some weeks
for a woman to know
she’s been abused by someone
who promised to be her home
maybe in a few months
it sobers up from these
looping patterns of poems
pain stored underneath
by the end of the year
a woman might still freeze
whenever they ask for time
or come too close for an inch
during dark winter nights
she might remain scared of
her own shadow that follows
wherever she actually goes
in just one year a woman
can learn so much through pain
not to shut up, but fight
dragging herself out of hell
she might as well find out
the power of people who
no matter how far from her
will never allow her to lose
in just one year a woman
might finally be able to
stand in front of a mirror
telling herself this truth:
you are the woman I have been waiting for my whole life
