Harvester
content warning for sexual assault
my body remembers yours: how cruelly
you delved in me, without question,
gouging the elm roots of my lungs,
never asking once. how the sap welled
at the site of each injury, how you
lapped it greedily, though it stung.
my heartwood receding deeper, my pith
growing fat and magnificent, more
than you could hold. you discarded
our twin selves so quickly i almost
forgot what it was to be with you,
buried pain in the soil of my belly.
but you did not reckon for the coming
of spring. see my branches reach up
once more for the simple love of the sun.
Michaela Mayer is a 26-year-old poet and educator from Virginia. Her works have previously appeared in Claw & Blossom, Perhappened, Q/A Poetry, Barren Magazine, Feral Poetry, Olit, and others. She has forthcoming poems with Monstering Mag. Find her on Twitter.
