Homage to My Hips

So.

Sometimes?

I don't like my body.

I can remember being younger and praying to God for thinner eyebrows, curlier hair, less freckles...and most of all?

Smaller hips.

Man oh man do I have wide hips. 

Nearly every woman on my mom's side of the family does.

I've always been a bit embarrassed by mine until one day, my professor in my 20th Century Women Writers class passed out a poem by Lucille Clifton titled "Homage to My Hips."

And suddenly?

I was proud of my hips.

My hips were powerful.

They were beautiful.

They were strong.

Now, whenever I'm having an "I feel ugly" day (Aren't we all prone to those?), I think of the poem and I hold my head a little higher and sway those wide hips confidently.

Because these hips...

go where they want to go
they do what they want to do
these hips are mighty hips.
these hips are magic hips.