you have never sat in the

coldness of the waiting room

filled with mothers twice your age,

holding the hand of your own mother,

sweating in shame and swatting away 

buzzing judgment simply because

your options were to terminate 

or to die and you chose not 

to die just yet, i know that—

your strut into that waiting 

room would be shooed and 

shunned, denied any moment 

to speak, as if you're

anyone who doesn't seem

masculine enough 

to hold heavy truth

in your courtroom.

we learn young that 

wrinkly men pull 

apart like dough under

long nails after long waits. 

you have felt the emptiness in

your chest for so long 

you've lost your chance

to know what it's like to feel that

organ drop, to swallow it over

and over again and hope

that your body attacks itself, to 

hope that nobody can see

through your doctors note, to

hope that the blood will stop

dripping soon.

you have never hidden in your clothes

or lied to save yourself, unless of course

you turned your secretary into

a womb, and pulled your strings

for a quick disposal. you have

never questioned the prison

of domesticity; you have never

questioned the prisons. 

is it nice to perch up high, untouched?

when you spit do you watch it land in

a pedestrian's eye, or just assume

she'll know where to step? every womb

a vacation you 

can't wait to take, 

despite what the locals say—

(they beg you to remain absent

while you drink their 

water and name them lesser).

are you ever embarrassed? at 

how much you think about our bodies

and how little we think about yours?

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