Self Portrait as First Lines by Preeti Vangani

Gabriela Camerotti


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Self Portrait as First Lines
 
My thighs are the train’s general compartment. Everyone get on board
The uncle who holds my waist like nursing his whisky glass
[You are too attached to yourself]
A woman lives as a woman observing herself from the outside
From the outside it looked like we had a healthy sex life
The day he asked for a video of me pissing
I bought the smaller sized dress to look the part
How are you still so tight?
The jump to zip the fat under my jeans button
Intimacy really gets me off
And the man who gropes my side boob on the train
And the man who gropes my big bum on the bus
And the man who pretends to find his keys near his groin
And all the girls who wear the Women are Perfect T shirt
A knife under my pillow where milk teeth were hidden for wishes
To come true, I wish I hadn’t shown him that part of me
Favorite Position: Low self esteem
A girl and her razor walk into a bar
Alcohol is a great equalizer
Vitamins, masturbation, and poetry
Love and marriage like clock hands, one chasing another
Brush twice a day
I care if I am kissed
A stand-up comic says to me: You have perfect porn star boobs
How do desire and repression mate?
Always in a trial room, I
A series of reflections, who won’t talk to each other

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Bio: Preeti Vangani is an Indian writer and currently an MFA candidate at University of San Francisco. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in The Bombay Review, Public Pool, Juked, Lines+Stars and Knicknackery. She has performed her spoken word poems across India, New York, Chicago and more recently at local San Francisco events including Voz Sin Tinta and Kearny Street Workshop.

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