XINYI HUANG
Period.
Period means three things to me.
A period(1) cannot be a period(1) without a period(2).
I’ve been writing with periods for a long time. I’ve never written about periods before.
pe·ri·od | ˈpirēəd |
noun
- a length of time.
- a punctuation mark.
- something we don’t – shouldn’t – talk about in public.
My friend’s mother bought her a chocolate cake to celebrate her period – to celebrate her first step into womanhood. The narrator of a novel, long since lost among my memories, laid on her bed to celebrate her pending death. She thought the blood is a period to life.
A period is an end and a beginning. An end to a period, a beginning to another. It’s always been a course, a cycle – of life and the continuity of life. The engine of a car outside roared down the street. Blood roars inside of me, its silence far louder and longer than engines ever can be. A period lets life continue; a period ends what must be let go. A period is captured time, moments stolen, the tiniest circle clutching empty space in its fist.
A heroine never reaches the virtuous end she sought because there’s no period. A maiden walks on as a demure maiden forever because there’s no period. I’ve always wondered why there is a gender to the prize of heroes, why man encompasses all yet imply masculinity. Why body parts are feminine, why job titles are masculine even when their ends are female – in declensions, in careers. Kubernetes. Nauta. Why there is a gender to not just adjectives but nouns, even when grammar doesn’t dictate it.
In some cultures, period makes women unclean. Unlucky. Unworthy. I don’t see why – if the flow of blood is dirty, wouldn’t that make everyone dirty, because they’ve got the dirt inside of them? Shame is learned, taught. Humans create shame the way we create words.
In the culture of writers, period is celebrated. A curtain descending on stage, a final beat to a song, a firm strike on the keyboard. Something to be achieved, not avoided. Another step, another breakthrough. A neuter in disguise – muting and emphasizing the human experience. Its brevity. Its vigor.
Finality is not a period. Finality is the absence of a period, when there’s no more to come, when there’s nothing to expect. I mourn the loss of a period, I mourn the losses it brings. I miss its discomfort as much as I miss an annoying sibling. I fear its sudden goodbyes, the same way I fear the empty smell of the airport weeks before the flight.
A period always ends; sometimes I wish it would end faster. The cold silence of a frozen tv, the warm dent in the sofa below. Traffic in relationships, arguments on the road. Staring out the window and pretending I don’t know. Almost wishing for another pair of those red booklets, wishing I wasn’t an excuse in the way. (The red’s the same anyways.)
Periods can end peace or argument. The end of one always brings the other.
The Uterus thickens Her embrace. Ramparts softening into skin, rounding into a cradle. When the emptiness registers, when the hollow in Her does not fill, grief pulls Her armor away. She no longer needs to protect Her child, protect Herself from Her child.
The ovum wanders, an unborn, a hypothetical, a child in searching, an egg that will not hatch, missing a future to swell up her insides and a home to toughen her outsides, empty circle, lost star, orbiting a home that does not belong to her.
The hug loses momentum, loses its object, and so tears of blood and flesh torn apart bleed. Yet bringing life into existence is just as painful as the loss of an existence, so as my body mourns, I celebrate. My body still belongs to me.
The comma trails across the sea like a shooting star, his tail disappearing into the dark. He aims at the eye of the target, his sun, drawing him into mutual destruction, his period, fusing the two of them together, him and her.
A period is:
- wrinkles gathering in the corner of eyes / the cry of a newborn and restless nights
- shoulders curling inward / shaking legs and wobbly lips
- shrinking body and shriveling memory / first bath and first word and first step and first day away from home
- smoothing words and swelling heart / last conversation with the last best friend and last graduation celebrated with family and last night sleeping in that bed
- helpless hands unable to clutch / first loss and last memory
- tearing eyes clouding over / first naive victory and last brash bravery
- digging out an acre of blue sky from a pair of failing lungs to plant in a growing mind / first sleepless morning watching a sunset on the plane and last night of solace hearing the sun rise from the hospital
- a breath – / first period(3) in a hotel bathroom and last period(2) typed out mere seconds ago
- and then none. / and every moment in-between.
- ashes. / embers –
Period records my life in breaks and continuities, in a body bleeding and puzzling itself together. The passing of time enables death – yet that end, that mortality is what gives life purpose. Every period builds to immortality; as the body scatters to stars and the soul wanders astray, nature will remember for me. Blood is its language.
Period. Period. Period. I wonder why I can’t say it out loud. It’s like sex. There’s so many other names – codenames, nicknames – as though using endearing euphemisms would make it more acceptable, less shameful. Everyone already knows what they mean, so what’s the point? In sixth grade they called it candy. At home we call it big aunt, old friend. I still feel the urge to hide the signature colors of pads walking to the washroom; still try to muffle the sounds of ripping the package apart. I’m in an all-girls school. What happened to the girl who dared use the name that must not be spoken, dared ask her friends outright – did you get your period yet? They were horrified; I was only confused.
Shame is taught. Shame is artificial. Shame is pointless – period is a point, the point I’m making right now. The point of talking about what we don’t talk about, because even if it’s considered inappropriate, it’s what I’m going to end on. (I thought about whether I should share this. But that would be rather against the whole point I’m making, isn’t it?)
Period (peer-ree-id | English noun, man-made word, punctuation) means three things to me.
- A period can end. Whenever it wishes.
- A period can be the start of another.
- A period can be spoken out loud.
Xinyi Huang is a high school student in Vancouver, Canada. She enjoys imagining the ends to stories and falling prey to sudden bouts of inspiration. She hopes to master the art of editing some day.