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the ache in my chest isn't the Black Sea
i was born something
wrong
something sitting heavy in my ribs, weighted and murky
something wrong borne in the cage, carried out to full term
a lamb to the slaughter, borne in the Black Sea body of water
carrying its weight of lambswool
heavy
on its body
the ache in my chest of flesh and wet wool precedes me
oh Black Sea, swallow me
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Chest tightness and chest pain as a physical manifestation of anxiety. Feelings of alienation and innate 'wrongness' ingrained into your core from birth. The common expression, 'lamb to the slaughter', where you seem to be both the one walking yourself into the water and the one fighting against drowning—weighed down by your own self. The Black Sea, with its history of contamination, is one my close family in Russia would consistently end up sick from every year. The distinction between the definitions of the words 'born' and 'borne', as in coming to existence as a result of birth as opposed to bearing something. Body imagery entwined with a tone of chronic uneasiness, desire for release, inner turmoil, and heaviness permeating everything you feel you are.