Endometriosis

Sometimes the pain
strikes as a Joshua tree
in a lightning storm-
my legs go taut, one ankle
over the other like my grandmother’s crucifix.
(In our home, Christ was gone from his cross, leaving only scents of juniper
My hips- they have no excuse
for such pain, no venerable fruit
thrust them wide like
an archer’s bow
My pain has no face that is also mine, no curl up in my lap and grab my finger with its whole hand, no.
Sometimes it quivers a gentle tingle, then throb and you are doubled over.
Strong as an ox, and you are defeated by these petty
womb pains
My first period was thick as molasses, it caked to my Hanes.
“Some women train hard and don’t get a period, ” Mom said. She’d gloated at beating the other new mothers out of the hospital. (Just get up.
Be stronger.)
The everyday pain of dull ache in the fingers and knees, knuckles thick and round as new potatoes- when I stretch them like wings I feel bones move;
I wonder if I should tell someone as my carpals and metacarpals fall to one side like dried switches.
But who would listen?
You’re upset about the infertility, they say. There’s no pain during intercourse, so what’s the matter?
Women are resilient, they tell you, built for endurance, for the long haul, quietly discreetly over-the-counter medicating, sleeping it off, in my day a swig of whiskey did wonders.
But me, I have no sire to furnish me a rug under which to sweep my sorrows.
I have only this pain-
Hush now, I don’t want to
wake it