Chris “Ludacris” Bridges
Usher, “Yeah!”
Nah. In the streets, watch me spit, suck, stuff, scrawl, loop, lilt, launch, lick—
out loud. Do deep squats at stoplights, and grind it loose while leaning
at the bus stop. I don’t stop. Ride the pole on the A train, up & down, don’t
give a thousand shits. You can witness. Or not. See my sexuality like a stable
of yeses trampling through your gut. I’m gut-wrenching. Wrecking all
the systems you create to tame me up, pose & poise me down to nothing.
& in the bed, by golly, I’m a buttoned up, smoothed attitude having yes ma’am—
poised, cordial, crystal clear. I doggie style in a turtleneck if I please. Wear
big underwear that cover all my bottom if I wanna. Sip tea while you go down
on me. I’m proper, the exact equation of if you please, & thank you for your
patience. I’m etiquette-ed up. Use a lace napkin to wipe my mouth of your sex,
& the fancy china to serve myself on a gilded platter. All lady-like and cover up.
How about this? I be a freak whenever I fucking wanna be. And a lady
whenever I very well please thank you very much, sweet heart — wink. Stunt.
Ellen Hagan is a writer, performer, and educator. Her latest collection of poetry Hemisphere, was published by Northwestern University Press, Spring 2015. She recently signed a book deal with Bloomsbury for: Watch Us Rise, an upcoming YA collaboration with Renée Watson set for publication in February 2019. Ellen’s poems and essays can be found in ESPN Magazine, Creative Nonfiction, Underwired Magazine, She Walks in Beauty (edited by Caroline Kennedy), Huizache, Small Batch, and Southern Sin. Her first collection of poetry, Crowned was published by Sawyer House Press in 2010.
