Bitchery

after Diane Seuss

Devon Balwit

To say that I’m a bitch assumes it bad,
as if bitchery were not akin to surgery,
a pitiless excision of necrosis, an exorcism,
as if knifery were never merciful, as if some tongues
weren’t worth the stringing, Kali-ful leis
of welcome blood-bathery, as if a symphony
couldn’t jag like bottles breaking, or bricks
through windows even, or a pointed voodoo-sticking,
or a sawing of a heated blade, a deserved
severance, a capital castration, an unmaking
strangely peaceful-making, an up-and-taking, a role
reversal, the Madonna gone all riot gear,
her blue gown, a cape, her look,
not demure at all, but a grappling hook.

‡‡

DEVON BALWIT (she/her) walks in all weather and edits for Asimov Press, Asterisk Magazine, and Works in Progress, when not in the drawing studio.