once, you were
a tender child,
to pretty to be a boy, they both said
a mattress on their floor was your bed
you were five
too little to
grasp the pornography they showed you
too little to
not want to please them like they asked
with your little mouth
that should have been busy
blowing bubbles
laughing at cartoons
chatting to teddy bears
instead you asked yourself
am i man enough?
because, one day you got creative
and tried to penetrate them
just like that man in their video
you wanted to be macho
just like your GI Joe
and they had the balls to
turn around and laugh at you
and they had the balls to
call you gay, years afterward
poor boy, you were too little
to say
you know what? no thank you
i politely decline
i don’t want this forever stamped in my mind
i don’t particularly want my first experience
to be incest
no thank you, i’ll pass
for so long afterward
you looked for
a woman who would not
turn around
and laugh at you
because you feared
they had turned you
into a girl
you stopped looking
once you hypothesized
someone must have
ignored they had been girls,
not women
my friend,
you were, even then,
and now,
a MAN
