A poem by Sarah Kay, recited on video by the author
The Type is a spoken word poem written by Sarah Kay for her best friend, performed at Inner City Arts in Los Angeles, January 2015. The poem was inspired by a line from Detail of the Woods by Richard Siken: “…Everyone needs a place. It shouldn’t be inside of someone else.”
Lyrics
If you grow up the type of woman men want to look at,
You can let them look at you.
But do not mistake eyes for hands or windows or mirrors.
Let them see what a woman looks like.
They may have not ever seen one before.
If you grow up the type of woman men want to touch,
You can let them touch you.
Sometimes, it is not you they are reaching for.
Sometimes it is a bottle, a door, a sandwich, a Pulitzer — another woman.
But their hands found you first.
Do not mistake yourself for a guardian or a muse or a promise or a victim or a snack.
You are a woman — skin and bones, veins and nerves, hair and sweat.
You are not made out of metaphors, not apologies, not excuses.
If you grow up the type of woman men want to hold,
You can let them hold you.
All day they practice keeping their bodies upright.
Even after all this evolving it still feels unnatural.
Still strains the muscles, hold firms the arms and spine.
Only some men will want to learn what it feels like to curl themselves into a question mark around you,
Admit they do not have the answers they thought they would by now.
Some men will want to hold you like the answer.
You are not the answer.
You are not the problem.
You are not the poem or the punch-line or the riddle or the joke.
Woman, if you grow up the type men want to love,
You can let them love you.
Being loved is not the same thing as loving.
When you fall in love, it is discovering the ocean after years of puddle jumping.
It is realizing you have hands.
It is reaching for the tightrope when the crowds have all gone home.
Do not spend time wondering if you are the type of women men will hurt.
If he leaves you with a car alarm heart, you learn to sing along.
It is hard to stop loving the ocean even after it has left you gasping — “salty.”
So forgive yourself for the decisions you’ve made.
The ones you still call mistakes when you tuck them in at night and know this:
Know you are the type of woman who is searching for a place to call yours.
Let the statues crumble.
You have always been the place.
You are a woman who can build it yourself.
You are born to build.
The Type
by Sarah Kay
Hachette Books, 2016, 48 pages, Hardcover
ISBN-10 : 031638660X
ISBN-13 : 978-0316386609
goodreads.com – amazon.co.uk – Amazon Music (track 57 of No Matter the Wreckage)
Born and raised in New York, Sarah Kay is an alum of Brown University where she received a Master’s degree in the Art of Teaching Secondary English. After co-founding Project V.O.I.C.E. in high school and becoming the youngest poet to compete at the National Poetry Slam in 2006, Kay went on to become a featured poet at events and venues such as HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, the Lincoln Center, the Tribeca Film Festival, and the United Nations. This culminated into Kay receiving a standing ovation at the TED 2011 Conference where she performed “B”. An education advocate and keynote speaker for educational organizations such as NAIS, ECIS, AISA, NBTA, and IBO, Kay continues to perform her spoken word poetry to a wide array of audiences spanning several continents.
Thanks to Samvado for submission
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