Ella Harlow

Your Body, Your Boundaries

Poems are hard when It’s about a topic avoided In conversations Because everytime We talk about our bodies Some turn away And others straight up tell you To stop.

We skirt around the topics Skirt around lessons about skirt lengths and tea sharing: briefly hear about it In school learn words like safe sex and Consent - Hear the definition of rape But tossing out words isn’t learning Do we really understand What consent is Or is it just another vocab word? Will we remember that our bodies Are ours

We’re not too young to learn about rape When dress codes and classmates are Already sexualizing our bodies

Why should We girls have to worry about what we are wearing How come we can’t wear what we want to wear Boys are taught that they can wear whatever they want They can avoid trouble because “Boys will be boys” Why can’t boys just keep their hands to themselves As toddlers We were all taught that