Hungerstone

by Kat Dunn

To be a woman is a horror I can little comprehend.

I can never escape the past. Its mark on me has been made too deep.

SOMETHING IMPATIENT AND SNAPPISH has swollen inside me. I feel as though I carry some fragile, painful growth in my throat, and every small challenge or inconvenience threatens to burst open the pustule and fill my mouth with poison.

You are a song, Lenore, harmony and discord. I am learning to sing it.”

Pain takes me into its arms and makes a home in my body.

In my mind, a white rot spreads through my body like mold, the meat of my organs and the red spill of my blood turned powdery white, corroding like acid. It is in me, in my bones, my gut, my lungs.

What is a monster but a creature of agency?

All we can hope for in life is to know one’s own desires in order to be able to act on them. To want is to surrender to uncertainty. To step into the unknown. To expose ourselves to all possible outcomes and trust we will not be destroyed by disappointment.