Cheryl Aguirre
Shell
The red lined indentations
Crossing my chest
Laced around my stomach
Are the touch of an entity
Closer to me than any lover.
Familiar and tight,
They dig deep,
Carving trenches,
Never breaking the skin.
I wear the ghost of a bra,
Of a dress, of a sleeve,
And I am never naked
And I cannot see my body
That landscape constricted
By engraved grooves.
My mother dressed me
In a size too small
Squeezing me
Into places
Where I could not fit
And I disappeared.
I am negative space
In my Sunday best.
Airline seats
When I sit down
The edges of the chair
Cut into my sides
A quiet restriction
And gentle reminder
That my body,
Massive rolling landscape,
Beautiful voluptuous,
It may be, is not
The proper fit
For most, if not all,
Of the world.
Fat people are
not blessed with
Resilience, or infinite
Patience and understanding
Rather, we work at it
Make a concerted effort
To ignore stares,
Or seats made for
Smaller counterparts
Instead, we ignore
Reproachful grunts
And imagine
That the world is also
Shaped for us.
Figure 1.
Can you feel my ribs through the fat?
They’re enmeshed in the blood and muscle,
My skeleton is suspended
Cradled, waiting to be examined.
I went to the doctor for a
Split lip, torn ligament, low iron count,
And I had to wait for them there
In the operating room.
Rail thin and chiding,
She told me, I’m too young to be this big,
I’m at risk, I’m too big for the room.
I sighed and expanded,
I pushed them out of the office,
With my tidal waves of flesh,
They had to go home early,
Catch the bus, bike,
Their cars were buried under my soft stomach.
And the nurse, trapped holding my hand,
Could she feel my heart through my breast?
I promise it waits for her there, beating quietly.
Cheryl Aguirre is a queer biracial poet based in Seattle, WA. You can find their previously published work in Ghost City Press, decomp journal, South Broadway Press, Pine Hills Review, and The Whorticulturalist among others. You can follow them at @drowsy_orchid on Instagram and @Wheat_Mistress on Twitter.