Ode to a Life (Poem)

Heidi Walcutt

A little child was born today,
whether it’s a boy or a girl was hard to say.
The poor, innocent mother they quickly sedated,
While the doctors and nurses stood around and debated.

One doctor said “The penis is too small,
this will never, never do at all.”
Another spoke up “No, the clit is too large,
we need a specialist who can come in and take charge.”

So the call went out across the land,
and when a group of specialists was at hand,
A series of tests was the first thing they did,
the result of these, from the parents they hid.

When all of the testing and probing was done,
the doctors said “We can never tell them of their son.”
So the parents were never told of their little boy child,
who by a miracle of nature was born to be wild.

So they sliced and they diced, a new woman to make.
“To hell with the consequences, we’ll fix Nature’s mistake!”

Counseling next became their obsession,
they hounded and pounded into the child their lesson.
“You are a girl, there’s no doubt of that,
trust what we tell you, a fact is a fact.”

So she lived in the shadows, without any life,
she was constantly battered by emotional strife.
Never voicing her fears, her hopes or her doubts,
until she found ISNA and let it all out.