cracked girl, 
tell me your secrets, 
how you spill your nourishing water
through the splits
helping people grow,
but never keeping enough for yourself. 

forced girl, 
tell me your secrets,
how you shoved 
and filled in all the empty places with gold
so that they wouldn't see 
all the nothing that haunted you when you breathed. 

hair girl, 
tell me your secrets
how you grew to hate
the kinks that swirled from your scalp,
blooming when given water and warmth, 
that they were the symbols
of everything that was different. 

deep girl, 
tell me your secrets,
how you see  
the beauty in yourself in picture after picture, 
not minding how others snicker, 
and say that you are vain.

full girl, 
tell me your secrets,
how your curves
roll like the hills our ancestors used to roam,
flowers blooming at the splits,
how you are a walking reminder that 
this is nobody's body but your own.

star girl, 
tell me your secrets,
the stories you see 
when you look up at the sky, 
you gave all your light to the stars
so someday they could see you too. 

beat girl, 
tell me your secrets, 
how to stitch together bruised knuckles,
worn apart from caring too much, 
the scars that line your face because 
you were forced to grow up much too early,
the grin that is already sharp like a knife. 

soft girl, 
tell me your secrets, 
how you are gentle that 
you make other people break apart
and flow like a stream into your
soft arms. 

hungry girl, 
tell me your secrets,
how you feasted on the looks that
they gave your dresses,
licking up the want from your fingers 
like honey
and then never apologizing afterward. 

found girl, 
tell me your secrets,
how you realized that you were 
born in the wrong skin, 
how you fought to live the life
you know you always deserved.

wisp girl,
tell me your secrets, 
how you float away like petals on air, 
feather light touches and gentle smiles
making you up to your very core. 

girls
girls
girls
girls 

tell me your sorrows, 
how they beat you and bruised you
until they found out you were made
of fire and heat and everything
that they most feared,

how you wept to your mother earth
to come bring you home, 
your teardrops feeding the plants
that stretched their way to the sky. 

tell me your light,
how you piled together,
generation after generation, 
protecting each other, 
making sure you were safe 
from the hands that wanted to touch you. 

tell me your fears, 
the monsters that wanted to lap you up
until not a drop was left, 
not realizing that when you wanted, 
you were poison, 
and they would drop before they knew
what was going on. 

beautiful,
broken,
everything,
nothing,
girls.