Dangerous Bodies

“Go ahead and pee on the floor,” the radiology technician says.

I’ve been a plus-size beauty vlogger for the past two years, but I’ve been fat my whole life. Except for the day I was born.

It is the spring of 2007, and I have traded in my solitude for friendship.

He calls you makhtesh, a word he tells you means the expanse of the universe.

On a day I am walking with my cane / in Starbucks / the lady behind me inquires, / from her wheelchair, / if I am recently disabled.

Most of the time I can avoid looking at my left breast — or whatever it’s called now — but when I do, I see the little red capillaries above and below the seven-inch scar snaking from my sternum up into my armpit.

The big clock on town hall marks the hour, the bells inside ringing and ringing.

This is a body / You can touch me / I am organic matter / moving constantly.

People who claim spaces as sacred are usually referring to mountains covered in snow-dusted firs or ocean waters that received them in their brokenness and led them back to their unshattered selves.

In the Soviet Russia of the 1980s, my mom chose not to tell me we were Jewish.

I drove with no GPS. After what happened, getting lost seemed like a good idea.

I remember a time when all I wanted to be was Trash.

I am gripping my chest as my colleague attempts to reassure me. “The paramedics will be here soon,” she says.

Arriving home in his private plane from an L.A. movie set, Rick can almost fool himself into thinking that he is famous.

It hadn’t occurred to Michael that his head might get stuck.

As my leg was pulled in, I felt the most excruciating pain come over my entire body, from head to toe, traveling through every organ in my body.