My mother sat me down and told me she wanted to talk to me about something. 
She talked about some embarrassing, incomprehensible things. 
I was having lunch, so I wasn’t really listening to her. 
"Don’t let anyone touch you.”

Are you happy?
Are you as happy as your parents?
Do you love him?
Are you sure you’ll love him forever?
Is there such a thing as loving a person forever?

I was in sixth grade.
I got home one day,
And mama told me
“Go take a shower.
We’re going out.”
I thought we were visiting a relative.
I asked her where to,
“We’re going to the doctor.”
She explained circumcision to me,
“It’s a simple process.
It’s like a tiny pin prick.”

I was 19 years old when I decided to have sex.
I didn’t know what sex was.
I didn’t know what a physical relationship was.
Everything I knew about them came from the media.
sex, sex education, sexuality, body image, gender violence

Cleanliness is the most important thing.
You should smell good, and you should be dressed up.
I’ll visit you tomorrow.
Make your mama proud.
We’re all coming tomorrow to check on you.

All girls are born with something and it’s taken by their husbands.
You were destined to get married since the day you were born.
This thing you have, he is going to take it today.

I was not circumcised,
But I have been living in fear of it for the past couple of years.
I’m worried that not being circumcised will pose a problem when I get married,
And that I’ll be a bad wife.

I invented something called “The red lines”,
And I imagined them drawn on my body.
So that I could mark the boundaries that shouldn’t be crossed.

How does semen reach the egg?
No one knew where they met and how a baby is formed.

In my time, we didn’t go in for examinations.
We were circumcised right away.
I was in second grade.
My mother told me what was going to happen,
She told me that it would feel like a pinprick.