FOLDS OF MY FLESH

I was once a confident woman,

So sure of myself, so beautiful,

Until the folds of my flesh betrayed my days in labor,

“Don’t worry, the first time is always the hardest,” they told me,

Until my third took all day,

Now they just pitied me,

Asked me why I did this to myself,

But you see, I did it for you,

For the smile on your face each time you held one,

For a moment I could tell myself you loved me,

That this creation was of love,

Not force of habit.

“Why can’t you go to the gym?” you said when I caught you looking at the younger girls,

When I saw the pictures on your phone,

When I told you I was the only one your eyes and heart should desire.

That’s what you told me,

Right before our first,

When you were excited about seeing your progeny,

You’d say anything to keep me happy,

To keep me from murdering the child I saw you loved more than I,

“African men like our women with curves we can hold on to,”

What you really meant to say was,

“We want a woman we can speak down to,

A wife nobody else wants.

To feed our own insecurities, we want her insecure and not not confident.

And when she asks where I was last night,

She will cry,

But she will stay by my side.”

“Stop eating,” you said, when I was carrying our second,

I see how you introduce me now,

As Jane and not, “my wife”,

As if not saying it makes it less real.

I smell like milk and vomit,

That’s what you said when they were younger,

You can’t sleep through the crying,

That’s why you moved to the other room,

You can’t feel yourself in me anymore,

That’s what you said when you stopped making love to me that night,

“Its not you, its me”,

That’s what you said when you showed me your new mosquito wife,

And then I knew,

It was me,

It was the folds of my flesh,

African men was a myth,

They just like new things.