all girls are not princesses
Illustration by Beyza.
i wore fluffy tiaras & wished on fairy wings,
my girlhood pink & ripening.
i turned six & cried for Barbies,
taking scissors to their hair,
pulling limbs out of socket––
my mother laughing at a glossy photograph
of a doll’s head held above birthday candles.
melted plastic christened my adolescence &
the sting of strawberry sour punch straws
i twisted around my finger, daydreams of
boys that were too old for me,
too haram for me.
i kicked holes in walls & spat out baby teeth,
ripped retainers in half & sat silently in a therapist’s office.
bitten fingernails scratched my stomach lining,
blemishes stained my cratered cheeks,
redness bloomed under fingertips
as i softened salve into swollen skin.
my womanhood was crowned. ◆