Sweet vanilla illegal melting into me.

I eat the ice cream for the women in Kabul
and Kandahar and Mazar-e Sharif.
I eat for Bernice,
the body outlaw,
who went chunky-dunking in the pool,
making huge waves in the moonlight.
She said, “I’m fat, so?”
I eat for her.
I eat for Priya
on the treadmill at the Sunrise Gym,
who loved her jadhi
because it held her sari up.
I eat for my Moscow translator,
who told me she thought cellulite
was anticommunist
and she loved her pure Russian fat.
I eat for Helen Gurley Brown
that she will let herself be.
I eat for Nina and her lost breasts.
I eat for Carmen and her dreaded spread.
I eat with Sunita
there in the back of the Afghan restaurant.
To keep the pleasure,
to keep the future alive,
I eat for all of them.
I eat for my partner
that I may choose to be open rather than
hard.
I eat for my mother.
I eat for me.
Soft belly,
merciful belly,
receive, please.
Let the fat sweet sugary wet
enter and encompass me.
Let me not be afraid of my fullness,
let me not be afraid to be seen.
Maybe being good isn’t about getting rid of
anything.
Maybe good has to do with living in the mess
in the moment
in the ice cream
in the frailty
in the failures
in the flaws.
Maybe what I tried to get rid of is the
goodest part of me.
Think Passion.
Think Fat.
Think Age.
Think Round.
Maybe being good is about developing the capacity
to live fully inside of everything.
Our body is our country,
the only city,
the only village,
the only every
we will ever know

Rome, Kabul, San Francisco, Los Angeles,
Mumbai, Puerto Rico, Nairobi, New
York

Our body is the carrier of the stories
of the world
of the earth
of the mother.
Our body is the mother.
Our body came from Mother.
Our body is our home.
We are crying here.
We are found.
We are women.
We are too much.
We are empty.
We are full.
We live in a good body.
We live in the good body.
Good body
Good body
Good body

I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious. (A. Einstein)

-You are doing amazing things with your life to help others see who they truly are…I’m very proud of you, Sadie.

Michael H

~I have more important things to do than fight with my body.

~I deserve love and respect as I am.

~To keep the body in good health is a duty… otherwise we shall not be able to keep our mind strong and clear. ~Buddha