Hermaphrodeities

Wow, this thing is a MONSTER, but I'm really, REALLY pleased with it. I still feel like it needs polishing, but I managed to get my partner, who isn't a big poetry person, to call it "powerful," so I'm PSYCHED. Written based on my 100 Poem Project theme, "hermaphrodeities." You should totally go check out the book by the same name, written by Raven Kaldera.

Written (much faster than I could have anticipated) for 's Transgressions: Vices and Virtues Contest. The prompt: "In keeping with the theme of "transgressions", your topic this year (if you hadn't guessed) is virtues and vices. Is there really a difference between them? Can one person's virtue be another's vice? What makes something fall in one category and not the other?" I promise this is within the 60 line limit! I promise!

SO MANY REFERENCES. Parts of this are meditations on the definitions of "virtue" and "vice" as listed on the contest article, particularly:
vice
1
a : moral depravity or corruption : wickedness
b : a moral fault or failing
c : a habitual and usually trivial defect or shortcoming : foible
4
a often capitalized : a character representing one of the vices in an English morality play
b : buffoon, jester

virtue
6
: a capacity to act : potency
7
: chastity especially in a woman

Other references (because I think they're actually important for understanding the way I played with virtue/vice in this piece, and keep in mind that I DO NOT DO THIS OFTEN) include, in order:

• The Virgin Mary. One of my middle names is Mary, and my mother chose it because she had great difficulty conceiving, and prayed to the Virgin on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception for a child. Nine months later: TA-DA! Me.
• Spirit Animal: I am not talking about Native North Americans in this case, but indigenous Central Americans. Many Mayan people (NOT EXTINCT, they still live in Mexico) draw a line in the dirt when a child is born and lay the placenta on it. The first animal to cross is the child's spirit animal, and the child's well-being will be forever tied to that creature.
• Yarrow: this is a plant often brewed into tea to help improve clairvoyance and is associated with divination.
• Robert Frost's birches: "Birches" is one of my FAVORITE FAVORITE Frost poems (read here: [link]). One of the interpretations of it is that the birches in the poem are actually phallic symbols. If you want to know more about that, I'm sure you can find that analysis online somewhere.
• Fourble: IS A REAL WORD. I was so excited. It's a piece of mining equipment, also spelled "forble," but I liked this spelling better :)
• Heaven help you if you don't know where "fe fi fo fum" comes from. Or the Big Bad Wolf. Go look up Jack and the Beanstalk and Little Red Riding Hood.
• Victoria bones: Queen Victoria, thanks to constantly wearing a corset, had a waist of only 16" in circumference. Women during this period often used fans to help them breathe.
• (Light brown hairs: technically a reference to my favorite poem OF ALL TIME, T. S. Elliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.")
• FINALLY: Legion comes from the Bible. "Legion" is what a man possessed by multiple demons calls himself. Mark 5:9:[link]

OKAY. I think that covers them all. No wait, one more: the concept of people who are "two spirit" comes from the Navajo. They believe that there are people born with multiple spirits in their bodies, who are both man and woman, and because of this are blessed with greater spiritual power. If there is any gender identity I think fits me most, it is two spirit.

I hope you all enjoy! Sorry for the lengthy explanation >_<

Questions for critique:
1. What do you think of the flow? I feel like some of the imagery might not have a strong enough tie to the rest of the piece.
2. What do you think of the sections? I felt like they needed to be separated out somehow, but I feel like this could still be played with more. Thoughts?
3. I remain skeptical of the opening couplet. Comments appreciated.
4. HELP ME WITH THE TITLE! PLEASE!

All comments welcome! Thanks for reading!

"Poetry is Simply a Way to Stretch Myself Skyward"

In the end we’re all myths, hermaphroditic deities.

Our names are the most real things about us.

i. My mother named me for the Virgin

and I carry her legacy in my blood—

she is my spirit animal; the creature

who crawled first across the placenta line

outside my home. In truth, I imagine all

are wolves or coyotes drawn by the smell

of fresh blood.

ii. There is no purity in childhood:

we are simply jesters with blistered feet

and the purple skins of blueberries under our fingernails.

We feel no remorse.

Our bodies have not yet been burdened

with the weight of other hearts.

iii.

potency   portency   portents   ports

Before I make my tea I’ll watch my

little yarrow plants unfold themselves

fleshlike and phallic, petite bent men

hoping for heaven—a row of Frost’s

birch trees. Hardly potent in the dead of winter,

but witchly I will drink their secrets down.

iv.

foible   fourble    feeble   fable

                        fe fi fo fum

If power is measured by the air

with which we fill our lungs,

then call me Big Bad and scratch me

behind my furred triangle ears—these large teeth

were not made to bite

[you]—

if power is measured by lung capacity

then this great big ribcage of mine

cannot be contained by white Victoria bones;

I will need no laced fan to breathe,

my virtue is not the geometric shapes

of clothed bodies. I go about with

uncovered ankles, dusty and decorated

with light brown hairs.

I am a breathtaking Navajo tapestry.

Stick figures I may be, but I,

Legion, am many, and we wear the sun

as our crown.

Hark all ye who lay claim to only half yourselves—

on your wedding days, you shall speak

with breathtaken voices.

Mine will always rise in song.