Pussy

PUSSY

By Ieisha McIntyre

Women know the truth but close our eyes and pretend –

pretend, when you touch and we let you in.

You see, we know that pussy is just pussy when you fuck it.

Not a woman.

Not until you love her and surrender to that which is superior to the flesh

– the spirit

Not a woman when you call her baby.

We know.

But we close our eyes and remember when baby was a name called out of love, not lust.

Not a woman when you leave before sunrise.

Not a woman but an object.

Some creature with similar limbs.

Not a woman but an object of flesh.

Dehumanize her in pieces; let her be just a bucket of fast food chicken.

We know.

But close our eyes - open our legs and imagine love, and family, and garden parties in white gloves, pearls and red silk charmeuse dresses.

While men bone and debone, making women into poultry

We know.

Some how, in claiming freedom of our bodies we lost the power of NO.

No, to cowards who put forth his penis instead of his heart.

A penis, saturated in the sweat of too many lovers.

Lost No – to the man who cannot see the beauty of a sister or the possibility of a wife – of a mother, a partner.

Lost the power to see a woman in our own reflections.

We surrendered to the myth of the money makers, take a pill, liberate, independence.

But wait,

A life is not made on those without name.

It is made on the courage to face passion and pain.

To do so with others,

To call them by name.

Not bitch, nor ho, or some such thang – but wife, sister, mother, daughter –

we’re both to blame.

Because we know that a pussy is not a woman.

Not unless you love her, and claim her, and call her by name.

Child of God, reclaim manhood,

Reclaim woman hood, put down the blame,

put down the pain and take up your dignity!

It is worth more than the nickel you were told to keep between your knees.

Worth more than the dinner, the cab fare, the rent,

worth more than the mornings of waking up on your own,

it is priceless and powerful sacred.

We know.

A pussy is just a pussy,

Unless you love her and call her by name.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.