milk
—
And we were the girls who were told we’d be ‘spoiled’ if we let anything inside us before marriage; a tampon, a penis, a finger. Like a forgotten carton of milk left to curdle on a kitchen counter, light-swept with the day’s dying sun, our future righteous husbands could smell it a mile away. Our sin, our trespass. Our ache.
But what they didn’t count on was us finding something delicious in the damage. We weren’t giving away our virginity, we were taking our pleasure. And if it meant we were unclean, we learned to love that, too. Our lovers were leavers of bruises, blueberry-stains on our thighs and arms, they were the ladder of bites up a spine. It was better than anything else God had yet to offer.
We sat with our legs slightly open, we ate with our fingers. We tipped our faces toward the sun. We were the girls who would scream into the wind, who would kiss our sisters hard on the lips and spill ancient words into their mouths: Part the clouds, find your moon. Howl.