After forty years on the planet, you’d think I would be used to this. Public shame about my body. Opinions of strangers. The eyes. The laughs. The echo of car horns and abuse hurled from passing motors. That feeling of being overlooked or underestimated due to my size, or worse, being looked over and assessed and found wanting. Derision that seeks to and often succeeds in sending me into hiding. Into my mind. Into poetry. Into the safety of the lifelines I know best. | The Stinging Fly