#dear body

[thisisevak]

Self Portrait.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Georges Rochegrosse, Le Chevalier aux Fleurs (The Knight of the Flowers) (detail) (1894), oil on canvas

* * * *

Body, be who you need to be. Brown girl in an orange dress. Red macaw in a canopy. Be flock. Be the oldest living thing rooted beneath the language of things. The cypress your mother called Sarv-e Abarkuh. Be a life less heavy with history. Be the little boy who skips school to sell tea on the street. Be a box of pears clothed in gold paper. Be something more tart. Lime. Be mouth,  be kingdom. Wear something made of infinity. Be sunset over a silk Zardosi sea. Be the young girl who survived a drowning by her loved ones. Be acid. Be sailed. Be colony. Be endangered and dangerous. Wear your own damp skin. Body, be something useful. Be dam and river the desert like blue streamers. River the village like the saddest epic. When you lay in the street with blood pooling around you, be memory. Be at the center of living. If nothing else, be a shadow of the thing.

— Shireen Madon, “Dear Body”

[alive on all channels]

[ninaidea-exe]

[prince-luffy]

Why does my body have to hate me so much? Like, look here bitch, I'm already dealing with your chronic illness bullshit, do you have to add physical side effects of negative mental health too?

[tea-rabbits]

(Frigg has always helped me accept who and how I am.)

[mleighsquickspot]

Dear Body,

What can I say for failing you. No exercise lead to chub from my youth. Listening to loud music means my ears are shot, not wearing my glasses regularly means my vision will rot. The dentist is a source of fear so we don't go there, doctors in offices have needles they want to share. Barely eat a vegetable except in my Chinese food, but the fortunes put me in a good mood. Balance out salt intake with sugar, just discovered that water is good for ya. Thus from head to toe I've done you wrong placing us to young where we don't belong. Trying to change my ways and take care of you now, my poor body I do love you for finally standing your ground...

Sincerely,

Me...

image: Women Abstract Body by Magda Ziemak

Let me know what you think and pass the thought along.

[sallyspeaking]

I’m watching another round of “dear body” types of things going where people talk about learning to love and accept their bodies. And hey, I get it. I overcame an eating disorder, damn do I get the need to express that struggle and the power that can come from openly loving your body. And I know the power that seeing those can give to someone else; I am not questioning their worth.

But also, my body hurts me. Day in and day out for the rest of my life, my body will be hurting me. Maybe they’re out there and I’ve just missed them, but I have never seen a spoonie “dear body.” And I have no model for what that would even sound like. How am I supposed to love something that is constantly causing my pain and keeping me from doing what I want, with no hope it’ll ever change?

I see all this stuff talking about loving bodies for what they can do. For their strength and endurance. What about bodies that don’t have that? 

[lifeinpoetry]

So many words for god & none of them mean want.

Kristin Chang, from “Dear Body,” published in Two Peach