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
This was written to explore the different responses to bi-lateral mastectomies, one woman with Cancer; the other trans gendering. It was inspired by reading The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson, whose partner, Harry, was pleased to be rid of these cumbersome appendages & by my friend, Angela who had breast carcinoma and felt very differently towards the loss of *******.