Two Poems

& i don’t want to break no more

Verse I
white walls white jackets white sheets black
stethoscope wrapped around a white neck of one
doctor with black words that cut black like cancer inside
this black body me me can’t see the cancer see the way
the cancer sees me & you together all the together
places in this body break apart until you see me see
me only in broken pieces

Verse 2
it’s just a word. so say it like you mean it.
let it roll off your tongue like it does for the man
with the white neck in the white jacket leaning
against a white wall watching me shift underneath
white lights beaming their betrayal of my scarred body
reflecting his words back to me back to me back to me

Break
weigh me down to sleep or leave me holding this
weight my future in the hands of a rapidly growing
economy the size of a butterfly with the bravado of a white
american telling a black american where her place in the world
is how to exist in this world how to beat this shit like he beat
this shit with the best insurance money could by
.                                                                                        .privilege.

Chorus
cancer was the mistake that my body let happen     the mistake
that my body let happen was cancer  forgive my mistaken body
let happen my body let happen my body let my body happen
until it is me seeing me seeing me seeing me whole again

Splitting Hairs

I am covered in hair
Where women are not supposed to have hair
“Supposed to have” – a modal verb phrase
Signifying what is required to be a woman

I am covered in hair. :: I am not a woman.

The style editor of the local newspaper
Posited this theory yesterday: if after one week of no-shaving
He kisses you, then you are a woman.
If after three months of no-shaving
He kisses you, then he may not be a man.

I am covered in hair. :: The women have left the building.

Enter “the hair” — unwanted, useless, & what was
That other word the lady on the commercial used?
Yeah, that one.

Of note: the bearded lady was called a lady —
But she was not called a woman.

I want to make love to my man. :: ____________
(He has hair issues.)

I wonder if the Roman Gods asked
Of those they made love to
To remove their hairs before copulation
Or if they were like the Christian God
Who counted hairs only to prove His love.

Every Tuesday
I wait for cells that divide in my body
To die — they do not discriminate.
I am split in two, hair included.

I will not test this theory out:
Her hair is her crown & she is hairless::
Therefore, she is not a woman:: therefore,
She is not not _________ She is not
She is______________  S ____h___ e

______

.chisaraokwu. (her/she) is a first-gen American poet from Igboland, an actor & a healthcare futurist. Her works have been published in Tinderbox, Obsidian, Collateral, Glass: A Journal of Poetry and others. She is working on a poetry collection about the Nigerian Civil War.