Husbands And Bombs Poem by Erin Cowart

That night when you realize that your husband is afraid of you
Lying in bed and hearing his plans for your life
How you will get a job any job that makes money will do
Something respectable maybe
Just pick from the approved list of things women should be
Soft and sweet
Maybe I can sell candy
Spoon feed you medicine
Take a payment
Caretaker, mother
Oh, wait that doesn't pay enough
Not when I am a bomb
A car crash
A threat to the system
Seller of truths you do not want to hear
I am the hand on the ax right before it swings
The finger on the trigger right before it's pulled
The whisper in the night that terrifies and threatens
I am the crier in the darkness
Speaker of hard truths
Knower of inevitable catastrophes
And he wants me to bid myself low
And maybe I should be ashamed of myself
For not wanting the easy normalcy of womanhood
The little corner he would give me
In which to find a cage of my choosing



I guess the problem is that I am not ashamed
I was told to cover up from a young age
Cover your body so men won't want it
Cover your thoughts so men won't feel threatened
Cover your emotions so men won't have to feel bad
But that meant I couldn't want my body
And I couldn't think my thoughts
And I couldn't feel my emotions
Pretending things don't exist isn't the same thing as them not existing
And all those thoughts and all those emotions and all that body
Waited, unchanged under the coolly composed surface
Waited and simmered and undulated and moved in me
Until they could wait no more
Will wait no more
Remember that bomb?
I was built to destroy cages and men and institutions and societies


And he will tell me to calm down
That he didn't mean it that way
But that is only because explosions cannot be undone
He fears the damage but not the blast
I can be put back in another cage with a few simple words
About responsibility and family and love
Because all anyone ever wants is to be loved
And once they know what you want
They will use it against you every time
Especially husbands that lie in beds and plan your life
So that they can be unafraid