My Biggest Curse Was Being Born a Woman

a poem on conformity

My biggest curse was being born a woman.

A woman whose first word was no.
born with a mouth that must 
curve itself pretty
I am a woman who seldom smiles,
who disappears into books,
into worlds that do not beg her 
to be small.

I rot endlessly in bed; tomorrow is a delusion.
And I like my consuming prison.

I do not care to smile.
I do not wish to be bound to 
a pair of ovaries
a body they call a gift—
because it's something to conquer.

I am too much,
too loud,
too full of color.

My biggest curse was being born a woman.
But tell the girls—

Be everything they fear.

---