These are the kinds of litanies I use, to compose myself
She periodically brings herself back from the past to regain and maintain her sanity, her composure, her intellect. She tries yet again to separate mind and body when she is treated only as a vessel.
wait. I compose myself. My self is a thing I must now compose, as onecomposes a speech. What I must present is a made thing, not something born.
She is trying her best in an internal conflict to dissociate herself from the things Gilead does to her body (the commander in the ceremony, the doctor), but it is difficult because her body determines her so completely.
She tries to fight for her mind, even when the society she is in tries NOT to objectify women -- by preventing men from expressing their desire for them.