FOR THE LATINX RESEARCH CENTER, UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY
Revista N’oj Issue 5: The Body, Spring 2023
II
The truth is this:
I was happier when I was anorexic.
The truth is this:
I was happier when all I wanted was to disappear.
The truth is cliché, but truth nonetheless:
the sorrow and hatred eat you.
The truth is
it comes to a point where all the eating has been done
and you are left hungry, famished,
but still the pain of starving willingly is better.
…
The truth is that this is a selfish feeling:
the privilege of renouncing,
of being comfortable enough to hate living.
To go against survival instincts and zip your mouth shut.
Embrace the sinking hollowness of the sternum,
molten led sliding down your throat—a cold burn,
through pipes and walls, pressing your lungs and heart
into that plummeting hole loss left inside.
…
The truth is this: not eating is easy.
Easier than the taxing happiness of warmth in summer.
Easier than facing the mirror, wishing again to be ghostly,
mapping every inch of your growing body
wishing back for those mountains to rise– edgy spikes mounting from the skin.
Ghostly. Thin.
Easier than being happy and hating this body.
III
You know you cannot speak about this in your mother tongue.
Your mother tongue,
though close to your tongue and saliva
carrying the flavors of home,
is also bitter.
There are no words for this voice
in your Spanish, not yet.
Her names have not crawled
out of your throat
wearing round vowels and trilling Rs.
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