HCA’s Laurel (Ellie) Wishman had three poems selected for the latest exhibit at the Chocolate Church, Hunting Positive, featuring female artists from all over New England.

Skin Tight
Nothing fits
Nothing fits me, not your stereotypes or your clothing
Not your expectations or your imagination
A woman is how a woman is born
And I was born into this world to say that I am beautiful
That we are beautiful
But when I’m done smiling I look to you and I asked the question
Am I beautiful?
I look at myself in the mirror everyday and I tell myself you are beautiful, you are beautiful, you are beautiful, you are beautiful, you are beautiful, you are beautiful, you are beautiful, you are beautiful, you are beautiful,
You say a word one too many times to yourself and nobody says it to you
It starts to lose its meaning
It doesn’t become extraordinary
You see a shooting star every night and there’s no one there to enjoy it with you
Eventually you start to not wish on them
Until the entire universe explodes with a million shooting stars and it lights up the sky
It shows you that there are a million other people just like you thinking they are wishing alone
You could sit there and wish with me
Stretching your stereotypes across the sky until they break
Just like my stretch marks stretching across my body
They are there to remind me that I grew that I am still growing
They are the scars that tell me that I am not the same
Be the scars that tell me that I am change
And that the world is changing
So my clothing is not skin tight
Maybe I buy baggy clothing
Because I’m not ready for it to be skin tight
I’m not ready for it to hug every curve of me and fill the places I didn’t know I had
Maybe I will never be ready
Maybe I don’t get clothing for you
I get clothing for me
Maybe my clothing fits me
My clothing fits me in all the right places
It will fill the parts of me I want to
And I don’t care if it fills yours
Cuz my clothing fits me just fine