Fisting misses the inward finger fold, soft
pockets between knuckles, 8 hand candles.
I cannot stop wishing for my ex-lover’s back at night.
I am not ok—I do not look good, I skipped push-ups today.
My grandmother met my grandfather at UBC Vancouver.
Widowed, met her lovers at Rutland Redeemer. We
believe in gay rights, said my grandmother to her pastor.
Me too grandma, romance and marriage fucked me.
The hands and wrists are wrinkled now, too long in cold dishwater,
I’ve got to dry and oil them, trim my nails, delete his number.
Prescribe anti-fascia infection enchantment, medicate
wedding bells, intubate death-purse spells.
I believe in: night and my dog’s pacing lullaby.
In seventh grade I had a BMX:
I thought the girls would like me.
Every man dies alone, but watch me pop a wheelie.
Betty is a gender-traitor, Archie is a dumb dictator : black hair
supreme, blonde hair the dream. I want a curly-headed
girlfriend. Betty and Veronica get together in the end,
Archie and Jughead ride away, really good friends.
Hundreds between toes : tax to sapphic nation.
Miss Veronica, may I speak? May I worship at your feet?
I want misogyny reparation, I want a clean inhalation,
I want painless dilation, I want to birth a gay creation.
link to video
Norah Bowman is an artist & poet & teacher & rock climber living in Kelowna, on the beautiful Syilx lands, in British Columbia, Canada. Her most recent book, My Eyes Are Fuses, (Caitlin Press 2024) is a collection of experimental poetry that paints the lives of Roman Empress Agrippina, radical French artist Niki de Saint Phalle, and a woman escaping a marriage, asking what it costs women to make art and live free under the pressures of the patriarchy.
