Unstoppable Fragrance - a Poem by Malia Arrayah

Photo by jcourtneyphotos (IG)

UNSTOPPABLE FRAGRANCE

(a poem from "I bit the Apple" to be released in April 2022

I spray on a very particular perfume each morning

I stare into the mirror, and I forget the negative words she wants to shout at me

The demon inside my mind

She found me in my youth

When I was weak and confused

She snuck up on me when I was consumed in the realities of inequality

When I watched my limbs tell the world

I deserved to have my space invaded

This demon inside my mind

She never left

She made a home in there

A throne of disempowerment and bitterness

Every time a trigger occurs

When I feel alone

When the job I applied for rejects me

This demon uses a loudspeaker inside

To shout at me

“YOU ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH”

So,

I spray on this unstoppable fragrance

I mist it over my head

And I dance to music

Imagining all my happy memories

With gratitude

And the demon inside

hates the gratitude I feel

To say back to her “at least I tried to fail”

And I take a positive approach

Telling her that though she may be the demon inside me

I am still a GOD to my own life

And I wear a scent of power

I am an heir to beauty, to life, to luxury

I am the GOD of my body, my mind, and my spirit

And I exist far greater than any horrible sentence that tries to stop me

I wear this unstoppable fragrance

To remind myself

I am deserving of the best

And I am worthy of my dreams