After The Parade of Roe v. Wade

Would Joan Didion

Cry like I do?

Did she cry like I did?

Like I still do?

Would she have loved you

If she were me

Then she could see

And give her words to me

To tell me what to do

About loving you

How to feel

How to move-

My fingers across

My keyboard

And get the words out

Silly little patterns

Characters fly about

Meaningless western languages

Bursts sighs and shouts

Repressing the impossible

Sitting in my mouth

Tangled and chewed

I spit them out

Like puzzle pieces

On the floor

Forces of change

Completing my whole

Taking my time with each one

Trying my best to have fun

Taking pride in myself

For coming out of my shell

Even if Papa yells

I’m ‘goin to hell’

I facilitate my change

And make sure of my growth

I put my puzzle together

I sat down and wrote

Trying to make my difference

While I know what brews inside my head:

The inconsolable fact

The puzzle has been done for me

With everything intact.

The cycle of malice remains

And it hates change

Anxious fingernails

Scrag and pull

Attempting to kill me

But I am full

of the rage You gave me

When You said my love is only love when it can make a baby

When You stripped me raw

And called us crazy

What about Your Jesus?

Isn’t he supposed to save me?

Or is that not for us either

Excommunicated.

Human rights must be fought for

But Why so much fighting

Why so resistant to change

When it can only amplify You

Defy all the anger

And machine guns

And war

Defy all the laws

And Politicians

Who bore-

Me of their lifeless attempts

For they have no skin in the game

They run us around

Convincing us of change

Paint us streets downtown

Parading their efforts and now?

What can I be proud of since 2015?

That loving my girlfriend didnt seem so mean

So threatening to “so-ci-e-ty”

So if we can’t love here

Then at “home” it shall be

Only after the parade

Am I finally free.