Poetry | January 17, 2025

Joan of Arc

Like a razor scraping skin, I choose this
final word of confession. I am not afraid now
to be made bald, to let the fire of language
burn across the page and force you to see
me, hand strapped to hand, face upturned,
scalp revealed in the light. This is what it takes
to be made right, flooding open like a vein
to fill your vision with what I’ve hidden from
sight: a girl who stripped womanhood away
like a metal sheet of armor, pretended she didn’t
need to be seen as lovely, an angel wearing
a crown. My executioner, I’ll tell you anything
now. This envelope delivered, a letter to exhume—
final word spoken to an empty room.

Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA)

Final word spoken to an empty room
in the people’s house, where I practice the speech
I’ll give before box braids, bottle blondes, gray
combovers and hairless alopecian heads. I said
what needed to be said. I combed my fingers
through the fear I felt when baring myself
the first time. I know there is a risk you’ll see
yourself as separate from me. No American
should have to hide. It’s still a crime to let fly
whatever coils—or doesn’t—from our skin
as God made us. You can’t ignore me anymore,
standing smooth-skulled in the capitol. I yield
back, but before this meeting is adjourned,
it’s my moment to be unearthed, turned.