Consent by Tegan Bukowski
No means no, yes.
But consider a massage,
I once had.
It was
the slap,
stand on,
kneaded with shins and sharp arm bones,
Ass-crack-as-hand-credit-card-reader
type.
I tried to ask her to be gentle,
in my passive way.
Ouch, I said.
Less hard,
no standing on,
please.
But
I couldn’t bring myself to
get up and leave.
Even when my leg was bleeding
from her nails,
thigh muscle pulled from her weight,
and arm dislocated.
Women of War by Tegan Bukowski
From across the world,
I hear the echoes of screaming children,
the gritty pain from their stomachs -
hunger,
but also bullets that have found a home
between skin and bone and organs.
I do not know how to help them.
I would tell them it will be over soon,
because I don’t know what else to say.
But it will never be over.
Not for
the mother clutching a still baby,
not stillborn - no,
Still-Made
by those who should be brethren.
Not for the
grandmother who cries rivers of tears
for the sons and grandsons
crushed to dust on her doorstep.
Maybe if all of our hearts break
at the same time,
we can cause a shock,
a surge-tide of sadness,
that could wash it all away.