A water woman has no body
Emptiness is a blessing:
it can’t be owned if it doesn’t exist.
*
My father said to bloom but never fruit—
a small trickle
eating its way through stone.
*
I am one kind of alive:
I see everything the water sees.
I told you a turn was going to come
& turn the tower did.
What are the master’s tools
but a way to dismantle him.
*
Who will replace the blood of my mother in me—
a cold spring rising.
She told me a woman made of water
can never crack.
Of her defeat, she said
this is nothing.
Credit
Copyright © 2017 by Lisa Ciccarello. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on October 11, 2017, by the Academy of American Poets.
About this Poem
“Lately I’ve found, and I’m probably not alone in this, that everything feels like a little battle. Since poetry is where I work out my concerns and fears, I’ve started placing what I see as everyday struggles—with family, history, finances, enforced hierarchies, the weight of the opinions of others, existing in a body—into a heightened, sometimes bordering on epic, framework. This poem is a small part of that undertaking.”
—Lisa Ciccarello
Author
Lisa Ciccarello
Lisa Ciccarello is the author of At Night (Black Ocean Press, 2015). She lives in Portland, Oregon.
Date Published: 2017-10-11
Source URL: https://poets.org/poem/water-woman-has-no-body