[SPECULUM] ENVY

I was jealous of my brother’s race car bed
and jealous of my neighbor’s swing set.

In a memory, a house across the street
is knocked down by a yellow construction vehicle

and I watch from my uncle’s lap
where we sit in the attic. He has a penis

and I have a vagina. In high school
I was so in love with a girl I started

to hate her. We’d hike in the woods
by the creek and she’d pee in the bushes

like an animal.
My mother taught me how to squeeze

the juice from lemons by pressing them hard
against the juicer. We picked slippery seeds

from the grates. The girl
kissed me once in a dream

and both our vaginas were clams.
People have stolen three of my can openers.

At a trans conference, I went to a panel
where trans people showed the results

of their bottom surgeries. They stood in a line
at the front of the room while we all stared.

If I had a penis I would definitely
not know what to do with it. The first time

I had sex with another trans man
it took hours and hours. Afterwards

I told him I had to go to the bathroom
when really, I went to the kitchen

to eat a bagel. My doctor gave me
a speculum to take home

and practice. There’s nothing that will
open me. I watch a video of a woman

getting a pelvic exam. Her vagina is shielded
by a thin layer of paper. How does she unlock

so easily? I once opened a can of peas
with a knife.

At the farmer’s market I like to watch
a boy slicing meat—

bologna petals falling fat.
Speculum means:

to look at, to view. Nothing is real
until you get inside.

Then there’s the latin: speculum
“reflector, looking-glass, mirror.”

Row of girls leaning in too close
to the bathroom mirror.

There’s a doubling of me.
Dueling fragments. A mirror

in an empty cervix.
All the trans people with their

wonderfully constructed dicks.
My friend moved far away.

I’d still kiss her if I could
I pee sitting down over and over.

Squeeze another lemon—
fish a slippery seed from the juice.

I have a penis
and it opens.