9. Kia Muukkonen: Girlhood is hunger

 

1.

I hadn't held love in so long. My hunger for you eventually burned a hole in my chest and I leaked unspoken words everywhere. I still remember blood rushing from my stomach to my cheeks, it felt like falling back on a chair. 

I sat there, burning, watching: Are you terrified of me? Or do you recognize love? Will you hand it to me, to hold, to heal what I did to myself?

I sat there, burning, alone. You never liked when it got warm and I got mad at you. Everything around me burned to ashes.

When you're home you know how to move even at night. Everything is familiar. Some people can feel like that. You'll know how to move without hurting yourself and you won't fear the sighs when the clock meets midnight. Our sighs were a different language and rooms kept feeling too small. 

I am not a safe home for anyone. There’s no light left in me. I set on hell flames and now there's only ash holding my hand. What a lonely companion even for a haunted house.

It's dark when nothing is burning.

Lucky me, I see ghosts.

2.

3.

1. 

Text:

Kia Muukkonen

2. 

Text: (in order)

Madeline Miller

Karese Burrows

Susan Sontag

Margaret Atwood

Tracey Emin

Emily Brontë

Susan Sontag

Margaret Atwood

3.

Text:

Kristin Chang

Elana Dykewomon

Carmen Maria Machado

Sylvia Plath

Margaret Atwood

Photos:

Possession, movie by Andrzej Zulawski

Female hysteria on Wikipedia: “Women with hysteria under the effects of hypnosis”

Jennifer’s Body, movie by Karyn Kusama