How relieving to realize a word can mean itself
and its opposite. That sanction can both approve
and penalize. That homely is both ugly and cozy,
as it’s not beauty that comforts us but unsightliness–
clunky passes made on rotten couches, wiping
the sweat that sticks beneath our tits, flipping off
cars that nearly kill us as we try to cross the street.
Who wants a straight meaning. More human
that cleave both clings and sunders. And what
of the oldest woman who ever lived–how some
claim she’s a fraud, that her daughter assumed
her identity after her death. Imagine that
disqualifying. As if one woman can’t be two
women, or that two women can’t live one life.