bone

by Yrsa Daley-Ward

One part of me is roaring and the other wholly disapproves.

Do not force me to open up. Some books are bound tightly for years for reasons. Some books are burned for their own good, Love.

Women who were brought up devout and fearful get stirred, like anyone else. Want men. Want other women.

Thank heavens you’re resetting ever setting and resetting.

Loving someone who hates themselves is a special kind of violence. A fight inside the bones. A war within the blood.

They say women are gentler, treat each other better. Please. As if we never learned to eroticize our rage, to block out the screaming of the gut.

The most important thing to do is not to worry. The lines on your face will never stop the sun from coming up. Your tears cannot affect the weather. There are wars going on. The one in your body is the only one you can be sure of losing or winning, then losing again.

There are not nearly enough distractions and it can all get too bloody silent, which leaves room for dangerous things, like thinking.

“No, it is just a big feeling. One of those crazy backed up against the wall feelings, where every position hurts.”

Call the speaking clock. Know that whatever time it says is the time that everything has to change.

I love the word love, I do but only far from home.

Truth is a beauty, whether pretty or not.

Love doesn’t always mean you should stay.

You’d better learn to forgive yourself. Forgive yourself instantly. It’s a skill you’re going to need until you die.

Love is not a safe word. But it’s the safe things that kill you in the end.

There are parts of you that want the sadness. Find them out. Ask them why.

because sometimes you find yourself, some twenty years later or more still cowering still minuscule speaking still tiny lettering all the way in your stomach. Still a swallower of things.

If you’re afraid to write it, that’s a good sign. I suppose you know you’re writing the truth when you’re terrified.

Maybe your life will work. Most likely it won’t at first but that will give you poetry.

My mother is with me most nights, though. She was is my first love. I dream her fiercely and in those dreams I love her and get angry and shake her and bite, grind my teeth and wake up, full of everything.