We are gender bred, not born into who we are
but told forever after what we should become
by people, parishioners, preachers, pariahs,
parasites, philistines. He is boy not because
of an apple that long ago lodged itself in his neck
or a cock that swells so often by his bowels. She is girl
not because of the comforting curve of her form
or the coveted curiosity of her cunt. We are
the persuasions of a thousand teachers, telling us
tainted truths, a society of susceptible species
separated into sinners and sheep, the fornicators
and the followers, the wilful and the weak.
Would the world have withered if it was Adam
who asked Eve to eat the fruit, to bite his banana,
to sliver and slide along its shaft?
They say She offered Him that first succulent taste,
that delicious decent into the depths of deceit,
of hell here on earth. Would the She that she became
still have been seen as the serpent if the tale
had been twisted in other hands?
He can be action man, aviator, astronaut,
anything he wants. She is the princess, in the palace,
painting her nails, waiting for her prince to awake her,
revive her, alive her. He is Cock, craved and conquering,
she is Cunt, shunned and shamed. From his mouth
the cunt is the sweet summation of comfort
commented on in casual conversation. From her lips,
the cunt becomes a dirty thing, a degradation,
but cunt is a just word, a name given by living, breathing,
robbing, raping, hungry men. When will it be her word,
heralded for all its bounty? When will it be her strength,
her Cunt, just like his Cock, pecked, playful and proud,
worshiped not just for the warmth within its walls?

All words and Sketches by Damien B. Donnelly