Ammar Aziz
Men always laughed
About my slightly overgrown breasts:
‘Boys are not supposed to have
These things!’
This made me a bit of a hunchback.
Stiff walk, rounded shoulders,
hiding ‘things’, beneath my loose shirt,
I was scared of becoming a woman
As a preteen. Why can’t I be like you?
Why do I have this mess, father?
“You have to run and grow,
That’s all you need to know.”
Later, the breasts of my lovers,
I always found drear –
Unwanted vines,
Grown out of fear.
I never grew old, father.
I have always walked slow.
The hunchback in me
Does not let me grow.
