Laying Down Arms

This year I am not going to whore myself out to the elliptical in exchange for well-toned arms. I am going to lay down my arms in the war against my body. I am going to lay down on my arms and rest. I am going to love my arms for everything they do and everything they are: the miracle of my arms. I am going to lay my arms over the shoulders of my friends and my family. I am going to spread my arms out on newspapers in the yard and dismantle them and melt down the parts to sell for cash and use the cash to fund a huge full-fat feast for everyone I love and everyone I don't love, too. And I hope one day that when I wave at my friends from across the street, the fat below my upper arms is copious enough to jiggle excitedly and bounce around in a joyous blob, as an added "hello I love you!" just to them. And I won't let the lady at the gym scare me about my arms jiggling when I get older. I want my arms to jiggle.

About a year ago in dance class, when I was dancing but not really dancing because really I was worrying about getting fat, I heard a voice say, "No matter how heavy you are, the earth will always hold you."

In this hair-shirty month of us all trying to whip ourselves into some kind of "shape", mental or physical, I hope that you will remember to just lie down on a patch of earth now and then, and feel how much you are loved.


--> Bone Density
Once a vaporous thing,
a bird bone body
yearning for God,

the time of my fragility has past.
My bones have weight.
My bones carry
the fat of my landscape,
muscles forged by the rocky trek,
tendons sleek as tree roots.

I want to land thick
on the sweet dark soil,
feel the earth
bear my weight,

and how peacefully
I give myself
to be held.

--Kristen McHenry