Emily Elizabeth Buckley

‘painful, disabling cramps in the lower abdomen’

Few people feel where their ovaries are.

I guess people know the rough placement,

they could point and pick them out on a chart.

They vaguely know how the misplacement

of growing tissue, and of bleeding cysts

make the ovaries flood with hormones

and make stabbing pain and swelling persist.

They don’t know it aches down to your bones.

Now I know where my left ovary is,

cupped in inflamed flesh, feeling writhing strife.

It’s walking across a tightrope, and its

balancing on the edge of a steak knife.

When it falls, and tears its fragile skin

waves of pain erupt through my abdomen.

Previously published: Rising Phoenix Review