BODY IMAGE Poem: Supermodel, by Hetta Jones

From now on
I am going to walk into every room
like a supermodel
after all, a supermodel does.

She is just an anorexic teenager
who hasn’t done anything.
How much more right and reason
have I to strut?

Me: who has exploded a career
built and destroyed financial security
housed five humans
(and brought three to life).

They would be right to look
at me like I am the most rare
and precious element on Earth.
Like I might explode

or make all their dreams come true.
I am going to walk
into every room as though
I own it and

the land it’s built on,
right down to the Earth’s core.
Because after all, I do.
I have built, I have destroyed

and will do it all again.
I don’t dance like I have
diamonds at the meeting of my thighs.
I don’t dance at all.

I have them in my veins
and that makes me hard, but sparkly.
Like a super model I walk, with all
of my five feet two diamond grit and grin.