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The vase filled with lavendar
I am a woman stood in front of a vase;
I am a woman stood in front of a table which holds the vase; A vase full of lavendar.
Are you half empty or are you half full?! I prop my head clockwise and then anti clockwise. I still see you as both. Your spires are thin but your purple flesh is not caged within. The buds of your growth fall to the base and I see as I crawl that you have angles of light too; I cannot perpetuate, evaluate, perceive and encompass all of you. Maybe that is the point? Perhaps that is what makes you so beautiful day and night.
I am a woman stood in front of a table which holds the vase filled with lavendar picked last September— and I can’t help but be envious of the life you have that I do not; The vase is empty and the purple flesh you grew withers slowly. But I still wish to be you, just like you— or maybe even you.
No matter how tall I stand; I’m still a woman laced and pulled into a corset. I’m forced to walk with my head poised centrally upright and my spine corded into a line. There’s a natural curve but I can’t flourish, accentuate or cherish my body; Or else I’ll be forced to feel the leather of their abusive nerve and patriarchy. My nerves are always sharp and I carry my tools close by because it keeps me alive.
The mind I am held within is also my body; But you don’t seem to understand that I am not seeking approval of your decisions. I am yearning to feel the nature I was born to feel graceful in; The world I never felt I belonged in; The rules I had to sabotage and the cage I had to break free from within; No! Not my own mind. No! Not my own body. I’m speaking again of their fucking patriarchy! The cage I have been forced to reside and be abused in since birth. This is not the way I envisioned planet earth; The nature that allowed me to be born exactly as I should be able to live.
So am I half full or am I half empty?! I often feel both and it circulates in shapes I cannot express when due. It is not cyclical. I am not a vase or a flower. I do not have purple flesh or buds either. But I do feel I resemble the strain you prop as you wither; I cannot bring myself to hand you back to the soil; I’m afraid that without you I would be lost in a perpetuating evaluation that I cannot escape perceiving; Because you somehow encompass me. One day I think we will both be free.
I am a woman stood in front of a table holding a vase filled with lavendar that stands tall still even as it is able to naturally wither; I remember— Without that corset and without that bustle that I am forced to wear underneath my dress; I would also be able to breathe and run. I would be free with the breeze too; Even when stuck inside to fill a vase. I once wished to be more like you— dried lavendar with fragrant purple flesh still fragrant and free— not just with the breeze.
I am a woman stood in front of a table holding a vase filled with lavendar; But I am also a woman with a spirit, wild, free and untameable. I know now that I am just as beautiful as you; Even without roots. I no longer encompass you and you no longer encompass me; I have unravelled the layers and define my own kind of free; I define what is me. Baie Danke.
© Lois Christina
I am a woman stood in front of a table which holds the vase; A vase full of lavendar.
Are you half empty or are you half full?! I prop my head clockwise and then anti clockwise. I still see you as both. Your spires are thin but your purple flesh is not caged within. The buds of your growth fall to the base and I see as I crawl that you have angles of light too; I cannot perpetuate, evaluate, perceive and encompass all of you. Maybe that is the point? Perhaps that is what makes you so beautiful day and night.
I am a woman stood in front of a table which holds the vase filled with lavendar picked last September— and I can’t help but be envious of the life you have that I do not; The vase is empty and the purple flesh you grew withers slowly. But I still wish to be you, just like you— or maybe even you.
No matter how tall I stand; I’m still a woman laced and pulled into a corset. I’m forced to walk with my head poised centrally upright and my spine corded into a line. There’s a natural curve but I can’t flourish, accentuate or cherish my body; Or else I’ll be forced to feel the leather of their abusive nerve and patriarchy. My nerves are always sharp and I carry my tools close by because it keeps me alive.
The mind I am held within is also my body; But you don’t seem to understand that I am not seeking approval of your decisions. I am yearning to feel the nature I was born to feel graceful in; The world I never felt I belonged in; The rules I had to sabotage and the cage I had to break free from within; No! Not my own mind. No! Not my own body. I’m speaking again of their fucking patriarchy! The cage I have been forced to reside and be abused in since birth. This is not the way I envisioned planet earth; The nature that allowed me to be born exactly as I should be able to live.
So am I half full or am I half empty?! I often feel both and it circulates in shapes I cannot express when due. It is not cyclical. I am not a vase or a flower. I do not have purple flesh or buds either. But I do feel I resemble the strain you prop as you wither; I cannot bring myself to hand you back to the soil; I’m afraid that without you I would be lost in a perpetuating evaluation that I cannot escape perceiving; Because you somehow encompass me. One day I think we will both be free.
I am a woman stood in front of a table holding a vase filled with lavendar that stands tall still even as it is able to naturally wither; I remember— Without that corset and without that bustle that I am forced to wear underneath my dress; I would also be able to breathe and run. I would be free with the breeze too; Even when stuck inside to fill a vase. I once wished to be more like you— dried lavendar with fragrant purple flesh still fragrant and free— not just with the breeze.
I am a woman stood in front of a table holding a vase filled with lavendar; But I am also a woman with a spirit, wild, free and untameable. I know now that I am just as beautiful as you; Even without roots. I no longer encompass you and you no longer encompass me; I have unravelled the layers and define my own kind of free; I define what is me. Baie Danke.
© Lois Christina
