Guts

My body’s not a hoarding
For your latest ad campaign;
A media visualisation
To fuel your gravy train.
 
My form is not a battleground
Nor politics best tool
In flesh applied as symbol
For female supreme rule.
 
My frame is not a vessel
For your secret fantasy,
A sexual opportunity
Or invite for misogyny.
 
It’s not a bearer of more children
Destined just to breed,
To churn out other bodies
And further mouths to feed.
 
It has no obligation
To be or stay one size
And it should not be judged
By any gap between its thighs.
 
You don’t tell me if it’s injured
Or blossoming with health
I’m the one that’s in it
I’ll determine that myself.
 
Regardless of the shape
This temporary meat,
Is not simply filling space
Between my brain and feet.
 
Its purpose is to let me
See and feel the world
To facilitate awareness
As my lifetime is unfurled.
 
Its strength may trough and peak
And change still more with age
But it’s another precious resource
Another laden page
 
In the manual of existence;
A thing that lets me be
And learn and grow and flourish
In response to all I see.
 
So take back your expectations
I just don’t need their weight
To burden and to stop me
Or fuel my own self-hate.
 
Please disregard the labels
That are hung upon my gender
I give back all those assumptions
Addressed ‘return to sender’
 
Hi body! Nice to meet you!
What shall we do today?
Let’s go and seek experience
In our own private way!