They Must Be Afraid of Our Blood

They must be afraid of our blood.

Not the blood of veins,
which they are only too happy to spill

But the blood that is called by the moon
and spills from between our legs

They say we are
Not to be touched
Unclean

I woke up to the roommate
On his knees on the bathroom floor
Rubber gloves and bleach
Meticulous cleaning the seat of the toilet.
I must have spilled some blood on the seat.
I didn’t turn on the light
to change my tampon
in the middle of the night.
Who does
when they’ve been bleeding for almost a decade?
Blood is no new thing to us.

If I had seen it
I would have wiped it up
in a swipe
without giving it a second thought.
No bleach.
But he was afraid of my blood
Disgust in his eyes
And wouldn’t let me clean it up
when I offered.

Not to be touched
Unclean

And now they seek to legislate
And regulate
Everything
that comes from
or comes with
our blood

They must be afraid of our blood

But we have come to know our blood
In many ways
Over these many years
It is of us
And we are not afraid of it
We bleed and we wash our hands
We bleed and we go to work
We bleed and we wash our legs
We bleed and we run and sleep and jump and have sex
We bleed and we wash our sheets
We bleed and we write poetry

And then
At times
We do not bleed.
And our blood transforms
What was half
Into a new whole.
New life
From our blood.

Its wisdom innate
Powerful
Holy
Vast
Deep
Unstoppable
Persistent
The world made and remade
Through our blood, flow, and Life.

And they can’t stand it.
They can’t have it.
They don’t understand it.
So they tell everyone it is bad–
We are bad–
Because we bleed
Unclean
Not to be touched
Dangerous

You may be afraid of our blood
You may be disgusted by life

But
we
are
not.

We raise our voices
Refuse to hide our blood
Refuse to be ashamed

Our blood washes away the old
Our blood nourishes the new
We are not afraid of flow
We are not afraid of life

It is time now
For us all
to return
to the blood.
To embrace
the deep red
flow of Source
that birthed us all.