By Neda Dallal
You are blood, muscle, viscera
Stretchy ligament and gristled marrow
Behold the miracle of you
Taken wholly for granted
You are bothering everyone
Hurting everyone
Their disgust for you has no quantity
You attempt to measure it anyway
Your grays are sexy one day
Horrifying the next
You never agreed to aging
You are not a girl, not yet a woman
Anyone older than you scoffs at your meditations on the theft of time
Anyone younger doesn’t pay attention
Standing between them you recognize that
You are middling in every sense
When your therapist asks you to
Practice being kinder to yourself
You remind her that the human condition
Demands sacrifice
Neda Dallal is a poet living in Brooklyn, New York. Her work has previously been published in Mixed Mag and The Bitchin’ Kitsch.