Psyche

One final push and the barrier tears
Naked as from birth, and just as new-forged,
I face the world like a blush-inducing nightmare.
Am I a phoenix on the rise?  Just an ugly duckling?

No bird at all, but something stranger, alien
Dripping wet, body slicked with birth-lubricant
An insect recently emerged from the cocoon
My wings are not yet dry enough for flight.

I am newborn, or else a wiped slate--
Tabula rasa.
Alone, I search the landscape for a clue to my identity.

In lieu of answers,
I am presented with a list of parts, tallying up my existence
A conglomeration of breasts, hips, thighs, eyes, ears, ovaries
Making up a being of flesh and blood and bone
. . . nevermind my wings.

Or my voice . . .
"Women, like children, should be seen and not heard
Ignore your mouth--don't be greedy
You only need one hole."

"Accept what you are given, be content
And pay no attention to that Man behind the curtain."

Unsatisfied, I persist
With one clawlike appendage I lift the oil lamp high
And I challenge the legitimacy of my gardenlike surroundings
Peer through the flickering light towards truth

. . . only to feel the sharp pain of some old trust betrayed;
the deity flees before the penetrating glow, and
I am a lost butterfly to forfeit my salvation in the finding of it.

But who needs salvation?
Lilith didn't, and in spite of what they say about her
I have never believed that the pleasure
My admittedly female body can experience is a sin.
And, I have never needed a God of Love to feel it
Whether Cupid . . . or crucified.

Maybe there is no answer, but only questions
And I am not an array of organs after all
Ego, superego, and id, interwoven,
I spread my newly-dried wings and set out
For what lies beyond His "paradise."