I’ve started to paint
the intense experience
of only painful things
the wounds that I open to see
everything that chains you
transformed into the green miracle
to take off the first layer
of the fence that separates us,
to think about collapse,
and if it’s possible
to transfer something that heavy
into a tangible form:
wind, silk, girl,
leaves, blades,
cupboards, sparrow.

I will heal better,
learn how to swim through
this bloody tiredness
to breathe through the mirror
the round porthole you can find
everything there is in.
I am the embryo, the germ, the first cell
of an aquatic animal
enveloped in the embrace
of extraordinary beauty
which runs in the vessels of air,
the tawny throat
of an immense tide—
mud, mother
from which will emerge
a new me.

~ Cento of lines/phrases found in Frida Kahlo’s diary and her letters.