I never looked up the surgery
I didn’t want to think of my body
like a constellation of parts
I begin to understand
the artist who painted Saint Agatha
holding her perky tits on a plate
bypassing gore—she had them wrenched off
I never looked up the surgery
so I can imagine the surgeon
in her skill removing them,
placing each beautiful and
bloodless onto a platter and
(like the angel in the story)
restored me to myself, the platter a relic
I had been blessed.
A.M. Goodhart received their MFA at Western Michigan University. They have published poems in Atlanta Review, Passages North, and Lake Effect. Their collection Neither Kind of Body was a semi-finalist for the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize at BOA Editions and the Pamet River Prize at Yes Yes Books. They live in Madison, Wisconsin with Molly Grue (the dog) and Garrett Merz (the human).