after my birth: an ekphrasis poem

AFTER MY BIRTH (1932) FRIDA KAHLO.

by: cielo rodriguez

my bones ache and i want to cry

but i don’t.

my body is laid out on the gravel like discarded trash

it’s not her fault

it never is

i can see the discomfort in her eyes

also the innocence

the difference is she will never hurt me as deliberately as others have—

her pain has been repurposed

it is a bark but never a bite

at least not toward me

all it is now

is a defense mechanism

used to scare away anyone who comes too close

indefinitely

i am my mother’s daughter

built strong from bones and sinew

pleasure and disdain and a little bit of miraculousness

i was lucky enough to be alive

born with an immense pain and sorrow

something my mother will carry with her

until she is brought back to the earth

she never meant it

it’s not her fault

it never will be

that pain—my daughter will be born with it too

and so will her daughter after me

if she is lucky my daughter

will not be born at all

just a figment of my mind’s eye

only a thought of hope and of promise that

i will never turn into the agony that

i have inherited from my mother

the pain that she inherited from my grandmother

and the countless women before her

i am curled into the comfort of familiarity

the quiet burn of an aching wound: the fetal position

my hands are weak and bloody

my knees are scarred from the roads i’ve fallen

on years before this one

i am not broken

yet fractured in different ways

i feel for the responsibility of something that isn’t mine but is at the same time

the pain and guilt of neglect on someone else’s part

i have lost friends many times

but none like have hurt like these last few blows

“hurt people hurt people” they tell me

although i’ve never inflicted it

quite like this on others can

i never will

that’s not the person i am

no matter how much pain i was born with.

cielo rodriguez.

---

My Birth, 1932 by Frida Kahlo

tw: gore, blood / unpleasant imagery

Ekphrastic poetry is a genre in which the author writes their poem about another piece of art, such as a painting. For this poem, I looked at the imagery used in Kahlo's work, the inspiration behind it and created a piece based off of the pain of female generational traumas.

Cielo Rodriguez is a current student at NMSU, studying Journalism and Political Science for her undergraduate degree. She enjoys writing in her spare time after editing at The Round Up. You can find more of her poetry on her Instagram @c.ielowrites.