only when you’re seventeen

i look up to the yellow ceiling and pray

to who i don't know- to the woman-god, god-woman

the one who ate the earth so it sits in her stomach,

unbothered.

the timer is still counting down, and it cannot be stopped

so i hook my heels on the sides of my chair and continue

praying.

sometimes i want to eat the world too but i'm not big enough

or at least

that's what they told me.

maybe after the timer runs out it will be different.

maybe my forest will grow thick enough that nothing can penetrate

maybe i'll learn to navigate that rubyfruit jungle

that lost womyn space.

cause when i studied for this test i learned about

the cult of domesticity

republican motherhood

the feminine mystique.

i thought maybe those women in the textbook

maybe they don't want to be pillars.

white pillars modest and clean and straightbacked.

sure we carry the earth in our stomachs but do we have to shoulder the sky?

i wondered this while the timer was counting down

until i had to take the test

until i turned seventeen.

i waited all day for the world to end

but the earth inside me rumbled on.