“Here’s the #SexStrikethat matters: Do not sleep with anyone who believes in forcing women to give birth. Do not fuck misogynists or white supremacists. Don’t have sex with people who don’t see you as a person. Apart from anything else, they’re generally rubbish in bed.”Laurie Penny @PennyRedMay 12
Today begins the great cross and clench
for the Guardian columnist
as her area shuts up shop in solidarity
with people who don’t want to be but are
pregnant in Georgia, Alabama
and places even further from Islington than that.
Tiny flying pickets circle
the entrance to the promised land
with signs that shout:
They Shall Not Pass!
or Dispute On Here.
Though you’d need
a magnifying glass to read them.
So far today, they’ve turned back
the former Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan,
who, on inspection, was found to be
naked beneath his gleaming white sheet;
a guy called Doug wearing nothing
but a Make America Great Again cap
imported from El Salvador;
some dude she met in college
who used to like to
have his bum lightly chastised
with briars; the professor she once,
at his own request,
fastened to the bedroom door
with strategically placed
black leather belts; and the late
Anita Bryant carrying
what looks suspiciously like
an excessively sized strap-on.
For none shall break this strike
until it’s achieved
the far better ecstasy
of enough people in the internet
exclaiming our heroine’s name.
© Kevin Higgins
Kevin Higgins
Kevin is co-organiser of Over The Edge literary events in Galway, Ireland. He teaches poetry workshops at Galway Arts Centre, Creative Writing at Galway Technical Institute, and is Creative Writing Director for the National University of Ireland - Galway Summer School. He is poetry critic of The Galway Advertiser. He has published five collections of poetry. His next poetry collection, Sex and Death at Merlin Park Hospital, will be published by Salmon Poetry in June 2019.
Kevin is co-organiser of Over The Edge literary events in Galway, Ireland. He teaches poetry workshops at Galway Arts Centre, Creative Writing at Galway Technical Institute, and is Creative Writing Director for the National University of Ireland - Galway Summer School. He is poetry critic of The Galway Advertiser. He has published five collections of poetry. His next poetry collection, Sex and Death at Merlin Park Hospital, will be published by Salmon Poetry in June 2019.
