For Dawn Wooten

By Maya Marshall

I have the good fortune to be free.
To choose.
To have part of my cervix intact,

to change the locks after
I’m attacked.

Somebody offered me a karate class.

I could still (with a little more
of the luck I’ve already enjoyed)

say yes to a man,
to a little sugar.

Nobody has a life without a woman’s blood.

I could still go under and come out whole
enough to make
another whole life—

a child to place against my mother’s bosom—a greatest gift.

Oh, to be free

enough to pick apart a rapist
man-in-charge, or

a god-doctor

with some script for all the reasons
he knows life is his enough to give
or take

like a kiss, or a breath.
Like a wave: to drown, uncover, or cover up.

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