It was summer when a little girl plays on swings and slides

with her laughter chasing behind

she runs in for a popsicle

the sticky purple dripping down her chin

It was still summer when she sits on the edge of a bathtub and watches her mother

weigh herself, for the fourth time this morning

and she waits until mother leaves to try weighing what the scale has to say

it is heavy on her spine

she teaches herself math this way

the scale becoming teacher and master in one

this fat young child walks to school, books in hand

watching the leaves spin wildly before resting under foot

she wonders if people will notice

that her thighs are thick like the chocolate ice cream

she had on a binge

her collar bones sit in the hollow pit of her chest

and her ribs bite her lungs every time she takes a breath

her nails are blue, but not because she painted them

and every night she faces judgement day

under the blue haze of the moon, shinning through

the bathroom window

she visits her old friend

fat young woman watches flowers bloom, but

wears baggy clothes that hide what she’s done

walks past magazine covers with headlines of “Get Thin Quick”

and “The Magic Weight Loss Solution”

they push her to be like the women on the cover

even without their magic

Fat woman fears the touch of men

has numbers swirling in her head of just how many calories

the grape he popped into his mouth carries

how many times her feet will pound pavement to remove the pretzel

from her lips

how much water she will drown in to keep afloat

The woman is gone.

the person she was has been swallowed by earth

roots forget the work she did to stay bones all her life.