Lee Mokobe
SandBoy
SandBoy
When we were younger
All the girls on the street
Were told to eat sand to help fill out their breasts
I filled my mouth with the Lord’s dust
And prayed for small pecs
And one day I woke with melons
Weighing heavy on my chest
And wondered
How could I have swallowed all that
Earth in my sleep
And isn’t that what it meant
To be woman
To be filled with dirt
And still blossom
To feed on earth and call it this body
And how this body is earth too
And that I did not want to be either
That I want to rip my chest open
And pour all this
Every grain of it
Back where it belongs
I did not ask for all of it
Just some
And ain’t that funny
How this body is at the mercy of this soil
That we are nothing but it
And can’t I be something that grows less
Like soot
Something that stains
So they can’t call me girl or woman
But call me earth
And body
And just
Me.
Sand filled.
Mistaken.
Unsatisfied.
Boy.
With sand for chest.
