“Like a swift migrating fish, the word cellulite has suddenly crossed the Atlantic.”
—Vogue (April 15, 1968)
Come, sea ripple. Come, ocean swell
of the world that seethes inside me—make me
shimmer like air on an open fire. I’ve been running
from you too long, my becoming body. My survival,
my second wind. My shoal schooling shoreward, persistently
pressing the rims of its own knowledge. How beautifully you insist
yourself on my ass—the love in my husband’s cooking. And on my stomach—
the belly laugh in my beer. And on my thighs—sweet riots of wild raspberries. Come
swift as a migrating fish with your wake of stretch marks, your currents that curve somewhere—
render me the map of a long voyage, a route for retracing by hand. Remind me I’m better than bone
reef, smarter than shipwreck. Shiver this storm-stilled skin—cast its sun-lent light in every direction.
Click here to read Elizabeth Moore on the origin of the poem.
Image: “53/105 Swedish Fish” by Matthew Bellemare, licensed under CC 2.0.
Elizabeth Moore is the author of The Truth and the Life (Alternative Book Press, 2014) and her poetry has appeared in Pangyrus, Print Funeral, Boston Literary Magazine, and Mass Poetry's The Hard Work of Hope series. She lives with her family in the MetroWest area of Massachusetts.
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Wow- this is every woman’s anthem.