Written by Herself: A Story of Feminism and Family

Inspired by “Written By Himself” by Gregory Pardlo

I was born to a world with air stiff as the knot

in my mother's throat when she learned she’d have a girl.

With two older brothers, I was born to white blinding lights

that made my mother's face glisten with millions of diamonds.

My father still thought her beautiful then,

my brothers too.

I was born in a house of mirrors full of smoke.

Millions of memories fill the room like water, and change like the tide,

leaving my image of the perfect life lost at sea.

I was born in a looking glass with a cork pushed deep into the neck—

I lay naked against the cool surface. I fear my skin would crack like ice

if I tried to break free. My mother taught me to rise above,

but I was born into a world against me.

-m.k.