Women Fix

The girl at the altar has stalled.
She carries sugar and honey
To build a new archetype.
That is her job.
But are there other ways of
Fixing it, she asks?

The girl scales a summit
Where she throws out
50,000 years of a system that
Ruined life for most of us.
A tipping point.
Her pointing finger.

It is now the future:
The enemy is still
The enemy.
The enemy is in charge.
The enemy decides things.

It is now the future
And simple fantasies
Feel like acts of defiance.

Women Should

How do you tell
This story?
You stand in a field
Painted with silence.
The field is not
Allowed to speak.
Then the field is a silent trick.
Then the field was never there.
You should go.
You should go up the path
That lifts off the ground.
The traps in the field
Dictate your every move.
So you do not move.
Have not.
The field is a translation
Of suffering and you are
Curled on the ground
In submission.
You receive a message.
It is not from a man.
It is not from the saints.
The message says
You are the new living.
It is a birthday.
And love is more powerful
Than this list of things you wish
You'd known.

Ashley Farmer is the author of the chapbook Farm Town (Rust Belt Bindery, 2012), the collection Beside Myself (PANK/Tiny Hardcore Press, 2014), and The Women (forthcoming from Civil Coping Mechanisms, 2016). She serves as a managing editor for Juked. Please say hello at ashleymfarmer.com.