An Ode to the Body, from the Soul.

This week has been on one. I found myself deciding to step out of my shell and read some writing in front of people for the first time in a couple of years. Funnily, I love reading my work, which is why I’ve shifted towards the audio format for my posts. Reading in front of an audience is always a bit vulnerable for me, which is something I’m contending with. More on that later. Enjoy this piece I wrote in late January after some health and body anxiety. I still really like it, and it freaks me out a bit that I wrote it. That’s when you know you have something good, if it feels a bit alien to you. I hope it helps you find peace with your body, even for a second. It’s interesting, the saying “the body keeps the score”. My body is not at war with me. I am not at war with her. We are moving as one, the rider and his horse, the boy and his dog. We switch places. Sometimes my body rides the back of my spirit to get to the end of the day. This is true survival, us taking turns to make it to the end.But dear body, you have been mothering me. Holding me more than I am willing to hold myself. Letting me know I am safe even when you’re not. Trying to be an indestructible thing. You are flesh and bones. Atoms vibrating with all their might. A brain firing and misfiring, losing lines and traction with time. A heart fluttering and thundering for more blood and life.Body, you are my enemy because you know how to be. You accept what you are and work with what you’ve got. You store fat for when I am hungry, burn it when I am full. You move before I know where to go, remember to keep breathing when I forget how to. You hold life like it is nothing for you, not even a second thought to want to be alive. Tell me, how have you figured out how to be properly alive? I would spend all day contemplating blank walls if you didn’t force me to eat, drink, and pee. Thank you for showing me the world even when I try to keep it from you.Body, your desire for life, love, and movement drives me. You are my inspiration, my true muse. My first art piece was making you look like me. I see you in the mirror and laugh. I pick you apart with my eyes. I devour you. I check every visible fold because you will not let me see the ones inside. It’s for the best. Imagine if I could prod at my stomach, the intestines, the uterus. I would pinch leg muscles all day if you let me, tug at my appendix, wait for something inside to burst.Sometimes I imagine killing you. It’s not personal. I just feel overwhelmed at all the possibilities you lay at my feet, the way you keep track of time through sagging skin and wobbly knees. And you distract me, ask me to upkeep you with stretching and exercise and good food. It’s exhausting, body. I know you are wearing my soul out, so it does not burn itself in the existential void. I appreciate your built-in failsafe. I hate the execution. I do love how you continue to hold me close, especially at night, eyes closing me inside of you like a suitcase, traveling into the future. Letting me rest, saying you will sleep too, only to stay up all night repairing yourself so you can carry me through the next day. I’m sorry I stay up some nights manic. I guess I desire more time with you.Body, when we die, will you still hold me tightly? No, you are the family dog resting on my lap, eyes shut to sleep forever, the unspoken understanding that I cannot come with you. That you will let yourself decay into dirt and dust in the ground, becoming one with the flowers, because you know how to just be. And I will leave you for the air, join the wind coursing in circles above land and sea because I am motion. I am life as breath, just as you have taught me to be.Alive & Fragile is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.A friend of mine requested a print copy of my poetry collection Love, Fiada. If you would also like one, you can place an order here until June 15th. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit catharaxia.substack.com/subscribe