Lodestar Quarterly

Lodestar Quarterly
Figure reaching for a star Issue 7 • Fall 2003 • Poetry

Conversion

Anya Miller

Peculiar.
Embarrassing.
The phallus enters my lesbian feminist life
with the green stalk of a tulip not yet bloomed,
reaching up from my desk,
ringed by the warm blue walls of my sanctuary.

I did not expect this gift.

I did not expect the sounds like fish flickering in a stream
that escape me as my hand travels over your chest,
lingering on your nipples.
I know what you are thinking. But I don't wish for softness.

The white length of you opens to me
under the cold sky.
Your hand rises to the place between my breasts
and I have named you.

I had everything: a self born again and again in the mirror of women.
Alone, my fingers reach home through a delicate forest.
My story burns,
giving sweet smoke.

Anya Miller writes personal essays and poetry. Her work appears in Bitch: Feminist Response to Pop Culture, ScarletLetters.com, Moxie Magazine Online, SoapBoxGirls.com, Revolutionary Voices, Escaping the Yellow Wallpaper, and the forthcoming anthologies The Pagan's Muse and No Such Thing. She lives in San Francisco and is working towards an MFA in writing and literature at Bennington College.

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