I was born a woman, you see
Clawing out of my mother’s womb
with an apology already on the edge of my tongue,
“ I am sorry,
sorry I ripped you from the inside out,
left you aching , bleeding and trembling-
something, as I will learn soon,
only a MAN is supposed to do
or so he claims.
“ Supposed to”
as if instead of that apology, he was
born with an heirloom woven into his existence
An heirloom of his right
over me, my sisters, my mother , her mother and mother of her mother.
Like he was born to exist
And I-
What does he think I was born to do?
I was born a woman, you see
With an organ you know nothing about
An organ so foreign to you,you laugh at me
An organ forever festering,forever growing
An organ called “Fear”
Fear you’ll be right around the corner waiting
to punish me for some make-believe crimes,
Fear you’re too lost and angry
to consider me human tonight
Fear I breathed too loud and dreamt too high
Fear I was born a woman in these times.
I scrape my knees, twist my ankles
and scratch off my face
But this ever-growing organ stays,
like a living, breathing thing
I can’t ever get rid of .
I was born a woman, you see
I must’ve been born with
a warrant all over me,
instead of skin
A warrant visible only to men
with hungry eyes and roaming hands
A warrant so strong that
All of my “No”s pool at the corner of my lips,
drip down my chin and stain my shirt
For why else would all of my screams
go unheard like that
Why, when I cough up blood and spell out “N-O”,
is his hands still around my throat, in my hair
and making sweet love to my innards?
The ones I threw up on the floor
when he first looked at me.
I was born a woman, you see
with your honour, your pride, your power, your revenge and your favourite threat-
ALL between my legs
And at the merest chagrin
You cover my mouth and lay your claim
Forever hungry
Forever excused
Forever thriving at my expense.
You weren’t born a woman, you see
So I tried to remind you of
your mother, your sisters and your daughters
But I am them
And you devoured us all
right after you devoured your soul.
We were, all of us , women,you see.