Yellow Curry
Do my insides change color
when I eat yellow curry?
Is the bubble gum still there
from when I swallowed it in first grade?
What of my life sticks to the insides,
changes it around or turns its color.
Where is the missing chunk of my heart
from that night he said,
“I don’t think this will work out?”
Will it ever grow back again,
or will I be forever mis-shapen?
Are watermelons growing inside of me
from swallowing the seeds
of what I really think
or have to say out loud?
Is my stomach still sour from all those times I heard
“You’re not good enough?”
A homeless man walks past me
and in that sacred moment of passing
he says: “Lady, you’re a fuck-up.”
I laugh.
I almost pee in my pants,
I laugh so hard.
And, that laughter is the medicine
that washes away the old sticky bits
that are sitting in my soul,
rotting.
Caustically eating away at my heart.
Every thought can heal or hurt,
it’s in my choosing that the answers lie.
Maybe, where it once left me feeling
yellow and permanently stained,
the curry can nourish my being,
warm up my insides
and fill me.
Photograph by Daniele Zedda
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