Samantha Lucia

Samantha Lucia (she/her) is a queer poet and photographer living in the American South. Her work lives in the body: its betrayals, its persistence, its refusal to be easily summarized. She writes from inside chronic illness, where the flesh is never simple and never quiet.

Easy read of the poem in the image above:

Maintenance

TW: disordered eating (anorexia, restriction, recovery), body dysmorphia, weight-related stigma.

My body — l a r g e
is slammed every day
against the anorexic ropes
that almost killed me at 25.

“How could you be anorexic
with all that weight you carry?”

I force myself to eat
because living to watch them grow
is more important to me
than a skinny body I barely survived.

I don’t starve anymore, but
I’m still obsessed with

every
single
morsel
that enters the hole in my face.