If men could bleed like women If men could bleed like women If men could bleed like women would the pain still be “in their head?” hours spent researching relief, another way to crown themselves brilliant, another way to profit If men could bleed like women feel it slick down their thighs, pooling in their underwear, sudden, heavier when they sneeze or cough. Would they blush? Would they go still, afraid of the rust-red print left behind? Would they feel dirty, cursed, unworthy? Or would it be a joke, a harmless accident. If men could bleed like women would they hide in bathroom stalls, twisting toilet paper into a wad, hoping it holds, mouthing a prayer that the stain stays below the sightline? Or would they walk out clean, chin up, because no one would dare point and stare. If men could bleed like women would tampons even exist? Would they accept death by toxic shock syndrome with the same shrug we are taught? Or would they be allowed to bleed as they please, no “intervention,” no apology, no plastic-wrapped shame. Would birth control and condoms be as easy as a bag of chips, a button on a vending machine? Would abortion arrive like an oil change, scheduled from your phone, in between scrolls, no questions asked. If men could bleed like women I mean really bleed, dark and clotted, face smashed into mud each time they stand. Would they stop writing rules about where and when we are permitted to leak? Would they stop invading, hands everywhere, entering any way they can? Would they lower their hands in the presence of their maker, the divine feminine, the holy her. If men could bleed like women would they finally see her and love her in all her choices? Or would they find a way to ruin that too. Phantom Father How do you mourn the loss of something you never had? Like grieving a limb that was never there, yet still aches How do you miss someone you cannot remember? Like trying to assemble fragments that refuse each other How do you yearn for lessons you were never taught? Wondering if I would have known what boys wanted had someone stayed, long enough to warn me Photographs should jog memory but mine have already run ahead out of sight Biological brushstrokes paint a portrait of who I am meant to be half Italian half Irish-American, yet I feel entirely orphaned They say you gave me your eyes, your spunk, your taste in music, but I do not know where any of it learned to live It is easy to wear indifference in daylight but at night I lie awake counting the what ifs and the maybes, holding my breath through another circle of wondering how different life might feel if you had stayed
