Progress
1. It started when
they sat us little girls at the kids table
so after we ate we could color with crayons
and stay out of momma’s hair
while she started sighing dramatically
And clanging those dishes
which only barely muffled the sounds
of men drinking and talking shit
of little boys chasing and catching
and pushing outside
Their bodies: unpoliced
Our whole beings: composed
We practiced coloring red flags green
We role-played tiny dramas involving
miscommunications and needs unmet
We pretended dogs were babies
and baby dolls were husbands
We borrowed lipstick from purses
and smeared it on our cheeks
We pretended to argue about money
and jealousy of the pretty neighbor
And we had a good time
until our nipples showed through our shirts
and the uncles watched too long
when we swept the porch
So we started hiding ourselves
talking and laughing less
We began walking quietly
and shrinking to fit in rooms
God bless the training bras
that helped prepare us for the day
when suddenly what mattered
was not our age, but how fast we
could turn and dart when cornered
in the kitchen
They dressed us without pockets
and question our hands in fists
We were given no option than to be like this
Too much not enough too late too early
too open too guarded too shy too confident
too thick too hungry so desperate so unlovable
too sexy too kind too smart to be broke but
were we born this way?
ina deficit wit pants that never fit
finna find out what happens next
when we don’t read between the lines
and fit perfectly between them?
2. Must I inform you of our staggered progress?
How vast this conditioning is? How our footing has never held?
Yet our hearts flutter and gasp to the wingbeats of birds and we
stay curious
Now we spot the predators
from half a block away
We don’t make eye contact
or we take a side street
Sometimes we pretend to be on the phone
3. It ends when
we cut the cord as best we can
Meaning, we saw at it with dull steak knives
the ones we use mostly on apples these days
I cut the cosmic crisp in half and admire
the two halves severed like a perfect broken heart
I go get my girlfriends
We pick mushrooms in the woods
Rhea Melina (she/her) is a queer multi-ethnic poet, birth-worker, parent, herbalist, educator, and hopeful romantic. Her chapbooks include a place to put things (Bottlecap Press, 2023), Not My Wasteland (Bone Machine, 2024), and Ballard Coyote (Scumbag Press, 2025). Her poems have been published by Elizabeth Ellen’s Hobart, Gnashing Teeth, Hare’s Paw Journal, Fiilthy Glo, Blood+Honey, Text Power Telling, and Black Lily Zine, among others, and her poem “Faith,” calling for a free Palestine, was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She believes that all illegal occupations and wars should cease and refuses to settle for less. found confetti is her first full-length collection and is available now from Carbonation Press and www.antiquatedfuture.com.
