That Female Feeling


He left with a weak smile,
the anemic cousin
of last night's wolfish grins.
Walking away he dragged the blanket
from my sleep-stoned body
so it flowed onto the floor
and swirled around my linen island,
now a dingy eddy,
slowly draining,
leaving me in the dregs
with that female feeling.

When I was rubbed raw,
sleepwalking pink and swollen
unpeeled and still unchosen,
I walked backwards along an unbuilt road,
confused a mile with a year,
and ended at the beginning,
holding on tight
to that familiar female feeling.

I thought he was made
of pondwater and oak;
silt and algae.
But this dry, salty taste
suggests brine and driftwood.
So like sand between my fingers
I'm letting go of this female feeling.

Only later, on a warm and humming tide
will anger come out to play.
But in a gentle wave of invigorating pain,
seething... is...soothing.


Eliza Hannon is a recent graduate of Wesleyan University. She lives in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, and works as a program coordinator at Abraham House, an alternatives to incarceration program in the South Bronx. She is the author of the blog, “Recessionist: Finding the Silver Lining in Gray Times.”