All Nonfiction
- Bullying
- Books
- Academic
- Author Interviews
- Celebrity interviews
- College Articles
- College Essays
- Educator of the Year
- Heroes
- Interviews
- Memoir
- Personal Experience
- Sports
- Travel & Culture
All Opinions
- Bullying
- Current Events / Politics
- Discrimination
- Drugs / Alcohol / Smoking
- Entertainment / Celebrities
- Environment
- Love / Relationships
- Movies / Music / TV
- Pop Culture / Trends
- School / College
- Social Issues / Civics
- Spirituality / Religion
- Sports / Hobbies
All Hot Topics
- Bullying
- Community Service
- Environment
- Health
- Letters to the Editor
- Pride & Prejudice
- What Matters
- Back
Summer Guide
- Program Links
- Program Reviews
- Back
College Guide
- College Links
- College Reviews
- College Essays
- College Articles
- Back
girl (see also: ocean tide in an embryo)
life: a promise floating in amniotic fluid, a cluster of cells not yet scared of the light. your mother gave you to the world, vernix, tufted hair & all. pudgy limbs cast in hospital fluorescence. in the spotlight your body does not feel like it is yours. & even now, you blame your mother for giving
because she taught you to do the same. you give yourself away to repay her debt & yet greedy fingers still count the price of a mother’s love. [of a mother’s life.] drown eardrums with the whispers of boys with dead ladybug eyes & a heart like the shell of one. they cling to you
like flies to honey. the feeling of being wanted reflects off their eyes and into the mirror of yours. & you add a page to your mother’s book: let kisses boil the tendons at melting point & watch as their wings get stuck in your skin. the buzzing will quiet. [you think this is
the closest you’ll ever get to flying.] the closest reality wrung from fever dreams where you find your soul still lost in thought. a minute of bliss at the ATM - bones crackling like coin deposits before the red blinks back at you. [in elementary school, the teachers told you to leave
your mark on the world. & they didn’t account for you, the quiet girl with mousey hair who came crying in the ER not because she couldn’t speak, but because she knew she was marked. a girl with her job already done & yet years of feeling unfinished ahead of her.] this you do not know:
your mother’s handwriting, her scrawl, her signature. instead there is a checkbook signed on the fabric of your mind. it is addressed to you: a promise made but not kept, an overgrowth of cells not yet turned to the darkness. a girl who is still an embryo when you look at the shadows.
& even now, you blame yourself for giving when only one had to.
& even now, you blame yourself for taking from her.
Similar Articles
JOIN THE DISCUSSION
This article has 2 comments.
Tho Nguyen is a Vietnamese-American writer and a rising senior in the Bay Area. Her work has appeared in Kalopsia Literary Magazine, Cathartic Literary Magazine, and the Bitter Fruit Review. She enjoys (read: adores) the words of Ocean Vuong and Stephanie Chang, and is always on the lookout for new authors. In her spare time, Tho can be found in her room, typing a poem in dim lamplight, listening to artists she forgets the names of too easily, or staring at the night sky, breathing in all of what surrounds us.