When I fall in love again
I want someone
who can hold my hair back
while I throw up my thoughts
and open a window so they'll fly away
and get caught in a tree
that we'll one day sit under
where they'll propose
and let me propose back
because I am a wobbly one
who likes the concept of balance
and stability.
Someone who will sleep on top of my body
and believe me when I say
I love the pressure
and the lack of oxygen
to my brain helps ease my chronic nightmares
--then wake up and be silent
because morning breath
is too much of a bully
to let my mouth say good morning.
Someone who pines for second hand embarrassment
enough to love when I
sing and dance around the grocery store
and get us kicked out
only to go across the street
for food that I'll either
barely touch or
shove in my face.
When we go to order
or pay at a place,
they'll understand that
they have to talk for me
so I don't get scared and cry.
I want someone
who'll shut up and be my muse
and let me make them
thousands of presents everyday
but also stress about Christmas and birthdays,
and I want someone who'll let me baby them
then have them turn around and
know that when I flop down like
a wanton cat
I'm getting some tummy rubs.
I want someone who'll
let me buy organic veggies
and not question me
when I sneak candy around my friends.
Someone who'll get that
I can't say 'I love you' in passing,
only when I look at them
and love bubbles over the brim of me,
and spills into their ears.
Someone who'll let me
stop the kissing
to run my tongue
across the sharp edges of their teeth,
and in the moment, let me kiss
what ever I want to kiss,
whether it be an elbow
or somewhere below.
Someone who can keep up
with my mania
and my hysteria,
who'll hide the sharp objects,
not because I'd use them,
but because they make my bones ice cold.
Someone who'll let me worry over them,
study them,
sing to them,
analyze them,
and crush on them.
Someone who'll let me lightly punch them,
and then cry sorry
cry sorry
cry sorry.
Someone who'll be interested in me,
want to know me
and
let me know them
and let me ask
a
million
questions?
When I find this someone,
I will flip my body over my soul's head
like a tee-shirt,
turn it right-side-in,
and hand it to them.

Gendering Woman *******

Beautiful, anatomical part //  Ugly, anatomical part
Natural, pleasurable             //   Burdensome, loathsome
Female Symbolic                //    Femme Symbolic
MALIGNANT                             HEALTHY

fearful, tearful, wretched     //  joyful, hopeful, euphoric,
bereft, wept, grieving          //  embryonic, rapt, relieving
leaving, loss                         //  believing, gain
m a y b e - d e a t h                                            r e - b i r t h
                                                   BI-LATERAL
                                             MASTECTOMIES
Operating Theatre

SURGEON                                         ANAESTHETIST
cleaning/ cutting/ knife/ scalpel   //   doping/ unconscious/ airway
blood / tissue                                 //   hypotension
loss/ damage                                 //   shock
drains                                             //   sinus rhythm
stitches                                           //   pain deadening
tight binding                                 //   reversal drugs
                                    
POST-OPERATIVE
a l i v e                                                a w a k e

draining, bound & stitched               draining, bound & stitched
                                            DRAINED
    ­                                   ~ UNBOUND
                                       -- UNSTITCHED –

Empty chest                                                    Flat Chest
FREEDOM from Disease                               FREEDOM from Dis-ease


© M.L.Emmett

I am a star gazer, too.
I gaze at him, in all of his starry forms.
The form that is a glint in the sky,
so far up, that no one can bring him down
while he works on what gives him another form--
the super-star.
A label that is rightful to him,
given to him because of
his shiny, ethereal words.
And lastly, and more importantly,
he is a sea star.
Being thrown around in this big, stupid ocean.
He clings to his rocks but sometimes
the waves are too rough
and a piece of him is brutally torn off,
as he has told me, happened recently.
Have no fear, Star.
Because everyone knows that sea stars regenerate quickly.
You will forever be,
floating,
shining,
growing,
Star Gazer.

I've been so healthy.
Three meals a day
keeping them down,
keeping on track.
Don't let me go back there...
don't let me go back

Yes, I'm still eating--
away at my brain.
Feeling gross and
feeling fat.
Don't let me go back there!
Don't let me go back...

I love my hair,
I love my nails,
I hate this extra weight.
I value my heart,
but not my stomach
stop thinking before it's too late!

Worry and worry
I'm counting again
every bite and
every snack..
Please!
Don't let me go back there!
don't let me go back!

I keep feeling
I'm going to puke
and that maybe
I should act--
NO!
Don't let me go back there!
Don't let me go back!

I've been exercising and
that's good.
But slow results
make me sad.
Don't let me go back there...
don't let me go back.

Why do I want to hug strangers all the time?

I just cry and cry sometimes not to be near them.
Those pictures, those old, old pictures just get to me so bad.
And I'm a sobbing mess on my bed.
My grumpy grandma Debbie.
My goofy grampa Tony.
My precious big cousin Jestin.
My baby, oh god my baby... 3 year old Conor.
My family, who helped my mother and I so much
in our rough times.
Took me in and
really really loved me.
In their little old beat up house that I love so much.
"Mermaid" tuna sandwiches made from grampa,
and sloppy joe's with plastic cheese from grandma
were delicacies.
Blowing bubbles with Jestin, digging that huge hole with Jestin, and laying on the back step with my eyes closed in the sun, were my most favorite things.
Still would be.
Thousands of miles cannot weaken
the magnetic pull that I will always feel toward them.