In a most recent series of poems I've titled "Girl, Girl, Girl," I look to explore the unapologetic realities of my current state of girlhood. Apart of a greater project, a chapbook title "Paper Skin," the poems featured are commentary of my own perceptions of the feminine experience.

Girl, Girl, Girl.

By: Kaila Davenport

Look desperate, hold these pretty things

with dirt underneath your fingernails.

I wish mom could still be alive enough to see you this way

because you can forgive her.

Get in and out of bed;

in and out of bed.

While feeling red and red and red and red,

you explain it to him although he will still not listen.

You can give in,

throw yourself sweaty and crying

young and hollow.

You can accept his reflections and

consume him.

He tastes better than you ever will.

Mercy, there is no time to believe the things that should happen will happen.

Tie your hair back,

swallow your swollen tongue.

Grit your railroad track teeth

and begin to spread and

extend your skin.

Break it open.

It is still not enough.

Expose a crimson interior;

red, red, red.

Show him all of the peeled remains on a golden bone platter

and when he sends them,raw, back into your kitchen throat

regurgitate his ignorance.

Ease yourself to oppose that

it is still not enough.

That you are a tender succubus

a sweet vice.

How dare you?

He was not prepared!

He is just a man!

He does not know what it means to be a servant of a body that serves other bodies:

never allowing the questions and a water droplet worries escape from a petite flower jaw.

Fermenting, until it is has expelled all it has to exude:

a beautiful shell, cocoon remnants and debris.

SHOUT GIRL: BE LOUD AND RAMPAGE THOSE WHO IMPOSE YOU SMALL AND CORDIAL. GROW BEASTLY IN THEIR PREACHINGS. MAKE IT ENOUGH. DESTROY AND DESOLATE. DO NOT ACCEPT ANY CREATIONISM OTHER THAN THAT OF YOUR OWN AND THOSE ALIKE. BE AN UNRULY. COVER THEM ALL IN YOUR RED.

BE A GOD.

BE A GOD.

BE A GOD.

On Feeling Another's Feelings

By: Kaila Davenport

WILL MY THOUGHTS BEGIN TO MOLD

LIKE LEFTOVER THURSDAY NIGHT FOOD ON A BEDSIDE NIGHTSTAND?

LIKE BREAD IN THE TRASH; WILL THEY HAUNTINGLY MANIFEST LIKE OVERDUE PAPERWORK?

A STALE TASTE IN MY MOUTH.

OR WILL THEY LINGER WITH POISE

LIKE SPRAWLING VINERY ON A BUILDING SIDE IN A GREAT CITY?

LIKE LARGE WOMEN HURLING THEIR HEADS BACK WITH UNTAMELY LAUGHTER;

THE WILDNESS OF A CHILD’S HAIR.

LIKE THAT GIRL WITH THE NECK TATTOO ON THE SUBWAY

LISTENING TO THOSE GOOD WHATEVERS IN HER HEADPHONES

ON HER WAY TO SEE HER FATHER FOR HIS 83rd BIRTHDAY AND HE STILL SMILES AT HER BEAUTIFUL LIKE LEMONADE.

I AM NOT SURE WHICH SKY THEY WILL BE WRITTEN UNDER.

I STILL FEEL THE VIOLENT THUDDING OF THE LOCKED BATHROOM DOOR ON MY SEVEN YEAR OLD BACK.

I STILL FEEL THE KISS OF FIRST TIME LIPS.

I CAN STILL FEEL THE SORE ACHE I DID THE DAY I TOLD MY COLLEGE ROOMMATE I SOMETIMES ALWAYS EVERY DAY FEEL LIKE SOMETHING PUTRID AND FORGOTTEN UNDERNEATH THE FLOORBOARDS.

I STILL FEEL.