Third place, poetry
They said the first woman was born from the rib of her husband.
But I don't think that's true
It is just a title born of later incarnations.
Because the first woman never married.
Because the first wife? Was not the first woman.
The body of the first woman was decaying in the Red Sea
When her successor rose from the dirt.
Her wide hips splayed out, pushed down
By the pressure of the sea.
When woman first rose higher than man, she was pushed down
Lower than the ground she grew from.
So the first wife was not born from her husband's chest.
Instead, she was born (As every woman after her)
From the fall of her mother's hips.
When man pulled woman down
He did not just pull, he flung her
He pulled out the muscle of her hand
He slung her, from her place on top of him
to the sea
And the sea, embraced her.
It pulled her farther still
And she fought.
They omit how women fight
Maybe they are hoping we will forget the option
But let it be known from the stretch of her lips
To the expanding of my lungs fighting for her air
The first woman was a fighter
She screamed against the tides
Scraped the water's edges
Its foaming, tearing waves under her fingernails
She tussled, wet, to the sea floor.
Rubbed salt into its pores,
Shot air bubbles through its depth,
And because it was bigger and stronger
The sea pinned her down.
And her spirit left her body, true
But the fight still raged:
In the set of her shoulders, the arch of her back
In the face of the pressure, the creak of her bones
And the weight of her hips
Her heels that dug into the ground.
The body of a woman is the body of a rock
Even when hollow, even when thrown so far down
Even when breached by turbulent waters
The body will not heal.
Down in the water, the first woman balanced on hands and knees,
Mouth ajar.
Shoulders arching up,
Her body frozen
In a final push towards the surface.