Poem: “Girlhood (Noun): The state or time of being a bright bloom.” -Desireé Dallagiacomo

Yuko Shimizu

Every situation is literal

and poetic

“why do you care about me if I am not your family?”

 9-year-old angst

using words too immense to understand;

death and grave

depression and harass.

How do I teach her to stay tender?

When she’s doing the prizefighting?

She will grow up and fall in love

But not until –

“I stare into the mirror and wonder

Why this face, why has he chosen these lips?

Has he looked close enough to see the massacre under my skin?

brutal guilt?

My hair, a gifted garland of agonies.”

Self-Love grows, just slowly,

watering the parts that need her most.

From the sickness it spreads like the roots

of a fruit tree.