I am woman speaking woman.
I inhale hatred and exhale hope.
Exhale flowers of tender resistance.
Flowers of persistence.
Flowers of grace and beauty and soul.
I am swathed in blue tranquility.
No cancer will eat me.
No violence can wound me.
No loss can boss me around.
They could not believe
I have no weapon.
So they took my arms.
But my weapon is affection.
I was reaching for you.
To wrap you in my happiness,
in the vines of my imagination
where horses with green legs
and hearts of red outrun hunters.
These blue daisies line my abundance.
You think I have no face?
My head is thrown back in laughter.
I am sacred when naked.
Touch me.
Don’t be afraid.
My pendulous breasts
are fields for flowers.
Bees feed on my milk
of human kindness.
Here. Let me hold you.
You are as I was then.
Lean of spirit.
Come. Lie down with me.
We will feast on history
and art fat with forgiveness
and love.
When she isn’t teaching the abundant virtues of the comma, writing about big hair and Elvis, and doing the Cha Cha, Kim Baker works to end violence against women. Kim performs in the annual production of Vagina Monologues in Rhode Island to raise money for victims of domestic violence. Her poems have been published online and in print. Kim’s essays have been broadcast on This I Believe, NPR Rhode Island, and two plays have been stage read at Culture*Park Annual Short Play Marathon in New Bedford, Massachusetts, about a middle-aged female survivor of childhood sexual assault and about a senior losing her battle with cancer but not losing her sense of humor. Kim lives with her wife at the beach in Warwick, RI. She can be reached at bighairedpoet@gmail.com
