One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman.
–Simone de Beauvoir
I was raised by wolves and I learned
to eat earth. I was raised by a bottle
I found washed up by my hut,
a cursive message rolled up inside it,
and I started tucking scraps of paper
down my throat: mantras, surges
of hope and hopelessness,
detailed records of everything
I’d eaten that day. I rolled myself out
to sea. I was raised by a Queen record,
spinning under needle until my body popped
and cracked with music and people danced to me.
I was raised by vending machines
and I learned to excavate myself for quarters.
I was raised by flame and I became flame.
I was raised by debt and I became debt.
I was raised by men, but instead, I raised
myself up, both skirt and wind, and unlearned.
MICHAEL MLEKODAY is the author of The Dead Eat Everything (Kent State University Press, 2014), winner of the 2012 Stan and Tom Wick Poetry Prize. Mlekoday’s recent work has appeared in Ploughshares, Verse Daily, The Cincinnati Review, and other venues. Mlekoday serves as editor of Button Poetry / Exploding Pinecone Press and teaches poetry and rap at Indiana University.
