Woman.
You are an oyster
ripening
a grain of pain
in the pit of your belly
until it becomes
a globe of tears
too round,
too heavy
for keeping
You fold
upon yourself
under blankets
under darkness
bearing your cross.
Silently.
A salty,
briny
flesh
coils around that little
morsel of suffering
turning it
this way and that
until it is made new.
Your tough shell
an unyielding roughness
Hiding, protecting
your vulnerability
No prying eyes can see
what you have lovingly
grown inside
Who knew that
pain can be beautiful, too?
****
Jade-Ceres Violet Dolor Munoz lives in Auckland, New Zealand with her husband and six-year-old daughter. She currently works as a digital marketing consultant specializing in SEO and Content Strategy. Jade has been writing fiction and poetry since her early teens. She studied AB Literature from De La Salle University and been working for over 15 years as a professional writer. She has written for a San Francisco-based broadsheet, several magazines, blogs and websites in Canada, the US, Australia and New Zealand. Jade started a movement in Auckland called Books on the Bus NZ—she and her husband have placed over 3,000 books in buses, trains, ferries, train stations and bus stops around New Zealand since starting it last year. She blogs about their family adventures at www.babyjetsetgo.com.