Tree trunk arms engirth me,
mirroring back my battle:
my tree trunk arms rot me
inside-out. They will not
let go of me until I shout.

Until my soul shouts,
"Corruption!"
Until my soul shouts
on and on about
its relationship corrupted.

The body balks but
numerical account.
So what's a girl to do?

"Hey, cellulite princess.
We can talk about nature
without petticoats veiling
your petty 15 pounds.
The thing is
you're big but not fat."

I will tell you what a girl is to do:
I will set myself on fire,
like a Plath doll.
I will topple myself into
an E-Z bake oven.

II. A re(butt)al

'but she woman
is rose(s pet)als peony
of wonder'

dear e.e. cummings,
you are kind
(of r
e
tar
ded).

III. An Elegy

I sing the body power outage
until I am hoarse:
an anthem anathema to the growing
ahem
expectations of a young man.

But the rubber balls you call breasts,
aggressively pursue an apathy,
unmatched by State Schoolers.

And the delicious curve of hip
is less appetizing
under fully fueled bedroom lights.

Not to mention,
the messy tangles of hair,
the torture racks and tortured stacks
of hair.

I could go on...

But I faced it long ago:
(and don't think it cynical)
the body expresses nothing
but an affinity for certain foods
until the lights get dim,
and limb by limb,
the lights go out.