The monthly pelvic spasms
wrecking my body
are a myth, and so’s
the clitoris, g-spot, and
female orgasm.

That sexual discourse
is a tool of castration
and emotional availability
is a leash meant to tether
masculinity.

Equilibrium has been:
-achieved
-is unnecessary
-a sign post of impending doom
dependent upon
magnanimity or malaise.

And yet every one
has failed to explain
how they got here
without a woman.

Tamara Fricke is the 2010 co-winner of the Gertrude Claytor Award of the Academy of American Poets and is previously published by The Lyon Review, Meat for Tea, Attack Bear Press Poetry Vending Machine, Whisper and the Roar, We Will Not Be Silenced, and has been included in a number of compilations.  Her poetry chapbook Our Requiem was released in 2014.  She lives in Springfield, MA, with an ungrateful cat, where she writes grants professionally.