june 3 2024

In the bathroom, I braid my hair under a Venus cazimi and I’m the most beautiful I’ve ever been. My lover walks in with sleepy eyes and kisses me in a way that can only happen in private. When he walks out I exhale and close my eyes.

I am looking on the inside of myself and there is a kind of death happening. I can feel it curling around a squishy core of who I think I am - bending, spreading, pulling apart. Something is happening to me, again. I keep changing.

I don’t want the same things I’ve always wanted. I don’t want to be who I’ve always wanted to be. I want something else. I want to become a different creature.

I finish another braid and look into the bathroom mirror.

I think I already know what she looks like.