the woman animal by Kyla Guimaraes (New York, 16)

& the ache starts when I see the heifer
plodding across tilled dirt, belly low & pregnant

in the sunset’s handsome shadow. & she pants against
the grass, ear tags swinging sublimely even

in their punched-through vigor. & I go home & pull
my eyelashes out in clumps, & look at my snarling

reflection until my face is lost in blotchy red shadow.
& how is it that furious animal feels easier than being a woman?

& at 13 my mother tells me the color red is womanhood’s
delicate mark but I thought red was for charging bulls
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& the angry pound of sweat. & I would rather trample the red
flag in unseeing brawn than watch my reflection swirl

down the toilet’s white basin & die there in little clods
of life. & monthly I am told what I already know

in pain. & this low-hanging longing for emptiness curls
up inside the stomach’s pit until it feels like a child.

& I am often pregnant with hope but it’s always stillborn.
& all my shouts cramp up in my throat, transform

into silence before I can even think of what to say. & red flag,
red stripes, haunt like memory. & this body is a condemnation

until I realize it is my job to love it & reinvent
it until I feel capable of loving womanhood. & the heifer

plods along. & her body sways broad-shouldered. & she
breathes womanhood & I admire it hopelessly. & she sees red still,

& she sees gentle too, & she transforms by sunset, into herself
again & again & she is not ashamed.


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Kyla Guimaraes is a student and writer from New York City. Her work has been recognized by the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers and the Young Poets Network, and is published in or forthcoming for The Penn Review, Blue Marble Review, and the aurora journal. Kyla edits poetry from Eucalyptus Lit. In addition to writing, she enjoys playing basketball.