Being thin and flat chested
I felt like the Other,
walking, mumbling
merely existing on the margins,
trying to hold on, to remember
how it felt to be me beyond my
non-feminine existence
-distorted
My body never belonged to me,
it was always their property
to look and to devour,
to judge and to despise,
always not feminine enough.
With a thin, awkward body,
a tomboy,
the never belonging aura
hovered above my existence for
decades to come.
A wall kept growing around me,
till my heart turned into cement,
and hardened,
cold, grey and barely living
full of self-hate bricks.
Years passed,
my body swayed
back and forth,
in time’s soothing breeze.
The wall blossomed
with colorful flowers.
My body gained strength and
I managed to break the cement
with my bare hands.
The insecurity bricks were destroyed,
allowing the light of real beauty
to shine through.
Photo: Pentax P30, 35mm with Pentax-A 50mm F/2 SMC Lens. Kodak Gold film 200. The Netherlands, 2014.