Maureen Wanket
Muscle
In the present moment of my body
Decaffeinated morning grace
Muscles aching
Well rested but not awake
Soft belly
The babies stretched that but
It was already stretched
The babies gave it taut purpose
And an excuse
Starting from ground zero
Giving birth with no painkillers
Gave me that now I know who God is
Gave me that now
I know who my God is
Suns out Guns out
Oppress this
Or how about try
I am honing my weapon for revolution.
Maureen Wanket is the author of the novels How to Be Manly, The Arrow, and The Ghost Daughter. Her short fiction has appeared in Esopus, Blood and Thunder, Night Train Journal, Gold Man Review, and Scoundrel Time, as well as in the anthologies The Monsters We Forgot: Volume 2 (Soteira Press, 2019), edited by Gabriel Grobler and R.C. Bowman; and The Female Complaint: Tales of Unruly Women (Shade Mountain Press, 2015), edited by Rosalie Morales Kearns. Wanket works as a teacher and lives in Sacramento, Calif. with her husband and two daughters.
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