CHOICE by Sarah Wyman

Capitulation East or victory West

my uterus may come to rest

splayed and flattened on a surface

smooth as a petri dish

where dreams of conception

slide into an oblivion of laws

on my body or yours, under the gun

for resisting the artificial implantation

of a monster’s rotting seed.

 

Unceded love and unwanted touch,

shock over the mechanical outcome

of a date rape upstairs

while parents stay glued to a glassy screen.

In the park, humping ducks teach teens

or slip their perfect families across a still lake

each identical iteration a long comma

feathered and reflected necks like a Sasquatch

arms upraised in threat or surrender.

So, the fallopian tubes flung high

seem to beak into politicians’ pockets,

and demand a sudden halt

to payouts hurled like scattered breadcrumbs

for mothers unable to resist the men they loathe

or feed the kids they have.