a love letter to my body pt.1 & pt.2

you ever just get distracted

by how nice you look shirtless?

because this is a new thing to me

admiring what a skilled surgeon

was able to craft out of

so much extra

wasted

useless

skin

and i spent 9 years

clawing at the inside

and outside

of my body

trying to cut out

what made me feel so trapped

and wrong

i was not nice

to my body

this vessel that houses

the very essence of who

of what

i am

i did not know how

to love the peaks

and valleys of flesh that

i only wanted gone

soft in what felt like

all the wrong places

and i am still learning

to love this body

sculpted into a form

i know how to live with

to live in

pt.2

and i am apologizing

to all the parts of me

that bore the brunt of

this journey to

the man i was always

meant to be

this is a love letter

to my body

to the scars where my

breasts used to be

that a dear friend

and then my mother

carefully bandaged for weeks

when i couldn’t bear to

look at them

this is for my

soft tummy

my thighs that jiggle

when i walk

for every part of me

that i once hated

this is for being able

to look at myself

in the mirror

and speak softly about

the softest parts of me

this is a love letter

to the little girl i never was

to the little boy i yearned to be

to the man i have become

and the body that carried me

this body that

sustained me

and this body that

refused to die