POEM by Ronda Piszk Broatch & ART by Danielle Hark

A Woman Holds a Baby and a Machete

by Ronda Piszk Broatch

Burnt

2018, Mixed Media, by Danielle Hark

You wonder what the punchline is, 
if there is another way to punctuate, 
say, a woman holds a baby, and

a machete was nowhere to be found. 
Or maybe the baby was in daycare, sleepy 
songs swaddling her while outside, let’s say
 
in a city far away, the woman wields the machete. 
She is fighting her way through a dictionary 
of neckties. She names her machete #MeToo

and the baby coos as the stars magic themselves 
into being. Meanwhile the neckties have no room 
for the growing thesaurus of women of any gender,

but so far stop short of the machete. The woman 
wonders, if she puts down the machete, picks up 
the baby, if she’d have to defend
 
her choice. The baby sees the woman as nothing less
than the goddess of her womb days, the machete
a natural extension of what she is meant to be.

Ronda Piszk Broatch is the author of Lake of Fallen Constellations, (MoonPath Press). Ronda’s current manuscript was a finalist with the Charles B. Wheeler Prize and Four Way Books Levis Prize. She is the recipient of an Artist Trust GAP Grant. Ronda’s journal publications include Blackbird, 2River, Sycamore Review, Missouri Review, Palette Poetry, and Public Radio KUOW’s All Things Considered.

Danielle Hark is a writer and mixed media artist whose work explores mental health and trauma. Whether it is through words, lens, paint, or found objects, Danielle’s evocative work blurs the lines between dreams and living nightmares. Her work has been described as haunting, terrifying, and transcendent. When she is not creating, Danielle can be found napping in her blanket cave with her black cat and creepy dolls. www.daniellehark.com IG: @daniellehark