But Now, I am a Woman By Raquel Thomas

But Now, I am a Woman

By Raquel Thomas

I have been spoon-fed love since before I was mature
enough to know better,
Before my body had curves and before my words
Had complexity
Dips and gaps and awkward pauses,
Before all of that, when I used to hug my pillow
and pray,
“Oh, please, won’t someone someday adore me?”

Then my chest budded like tulips during the
spring,
I scribbled the sentences within romance films
all on my wrists,
I turned my head at just the right degree,
Grinned in the right lighting.
But my world came crashing down,

lt was a tragedy without all of the drama-
That tragedy was me.

I was not the girl next door that the boy spent
his nights glimpsing through his curtains at,
I wasn’t the damsel in distress that craved to be
Saved

I was a woman, whole
I was both the cosmos and the spirit
I was leave me alone,and, leaving so soon?
I studied movies about lovers taking
risks,
I studied girls jeopardizing their existences for
fleeting glances,

For love, and for being loved,
And then I was loved and I loved,
And it’s hard when you’re old to be sold on such
easiness
When complication is the foundation of
everything