(dis)service

bent head and borrowed bearing
eyes averted and authored by
outward lens
in this factory mass-producing
man’s concept of woman

my seat in the line
was gifted by my mother
        from her mother
                and her mother
                        and her mother
scripted and unalienable
the whispered audit proclaiming
this is woman’s work—to serve

this is how it has always been

my fingers deconstruct tangled lineage
wrenching free from the line
each length of twining fibre
each strand amassed
from years of keeping everything together
this is not my role
outraged silence or disapproval
urge me to fix what I’ve laid bare

I have never believed in the product

I am
dispersing the collective