GYM CONFESSIONS: 1

I. Middle School

the carrion-climbing unit

sixth grade, suspended fifteen

feet up, body rocking into the synthetic

rockclimbing wall: a boat barely

surviving a ferocious ocean.

hands slid like dull skates

on slick ice as i grappled

for the plastic, pastel green

and red crags.

the harness dug into my skin,

made brand new stretch marks

on the bulge of my twelve

year old belly.

just a little further!

that over-zealous

gym teacher squawked

from the walnut lacquered

gymnasium floor.

the peak

of the wall was called 

the Hawks Nest.

i have always favored crows,

i have always favored giving

up if my success would not be

meaningful.

as sobs choked their way

out of my heaving esophagus

i was finally lowered to the ground.

did you hit your face?

a classmate asked as i swiped

the gumming-over snot from

beneath my nose. smeared

along the ridge of my knuckles

was a streak of blood, 

as if my mucus

had been replaced

with thick wine. 

II. High School

Hair Experimentation during Team Sports

The sophomore year gym elective at my high school was called “Team Sports.” The majority of this class was during the wintertime, so the 17 of us (an amalgamation of jocks and students just trying to get their health requirements out of the way) congregated on the basketball court to play kickball, dodgeball, wiffle-ball – basically all of the “balls” – for an hour and a half each morning before lunch.

On occasion, the weight room was opened if any student felt as though their time would be better spent independently. I took advantage of these opportunities; we were allowed our phones in the weight room, I didn’t have to subject myself to watching a group of boys take a game of handball too seriously, and most importantly, I didn’t have to risk putting effort into meaningless success.

I mulled about the weight room, sneakers scraping against the white-dotted, black rubber floor. I stood still on the elliptical, stared at myself in the mirror lined wall. Sometimes I jerked my legs back and forth while my hands scraped through the shoulder-length mop of hair on my head, pinning it back to imagine what I’d look like with a haircut one of my annoying boy-jock classmates had.

This became ritualistic: shoving my beat up Nikes on in the lockerroom, raising my hand for attendance, slinking down the liminal hallway between the basketball court and the weightroom, and situating myself on the elliptical nearest the mirrors before finally watching who I could become in my own reflection. This was not meaningless.

The only other students who used the weight room were a few girls whom I was cordial towards but not necessarily friends with. They liked to use the jump-boxes that were placed adjacent to the line of ellipticals and treadmills. One morning, one of the girls, wrapped in a dark green lululemon half-zip, looked over at me. 

She smiled, tightened her blonde ponytail. Her friends had stepped out to fill their water bottles when she told me, quietly, “You’d look cool with that haircut.”

III. College

ode to discovering gender success at the fitness and rec center

chlorine eyes like surreal rose-colored

glasses as my thrashing legs demolish

the swimming pool surface. hair slicked

back when i come up for air, breaststroking

the lap lanes like a butch-Olympian.

lat-pulldown-biceps stinging as i read from

The Pocket Sappho, book propped

on my thigh between sets. nobody watches

as i revel in my body finding 

nirvana with my mind.

would Afroditi marvel at my sweatsoaked

french-cropped hair as the fringe sweeps 

my eyebrows? when i watch the mirror

as i haul deadlifts to the crest of my pelvis,

would she know that i’ve found peace?