I am a survivor of domestic violence, and shame almost always accompanies this type of trauma. Shame lived in my body for so long that it began to feel like it was a part of me. Personifying shame in this poem allowed me to express my complex emotions toward it while the strict meter of the Sapphic stanza led me to the right words and images.  

Autumn Newman’s poems have recently appeared or are forthcoming in Cider Press Review, Pratik, Rise Up Review, The Orchards Poetry Journal, The Tiger Moth Review, The Rising Phoenix Review, and River Heron Review. Her chapbook, This Is My Body, A Flower Burst Open, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press.

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