Confrontation

What you have only guessed

is thrown across my cells

in shades of wilderness

and networks of electricity.

Rosacia marquees to declare

unpaved roads, a scraped knee,

a daughter.

Have a confrontation

with my cells.

Find where some are flushed rosy

and others the color of dark beans

roasted with decades of sun.

This one is a little sickled,

puckered around the edges.

Note it,

so that they have even more

justification for why “I shouldn’t

feel nothin’ down there”.

Color by number me a sinner.

4’s are for when I ate grapefruits

that left welts in my cheeks,

2’s for when it wasn’t making love

it was just making me remember

the 6’s,

the day God didn’t come

because I was young

and had the possibility

of becoming a woman.

Have a confrontation with my cells.

Layer me lovely for now.

Shove me into the corner of your cortex

the place reserved for the mutilated.

I don’t feel

like talking about it anymore.

http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/journals/2313097.html

Art Credit: Emily Kngwarreye. Awelye, Autumn