Naming

Of course, someone has named it “apron” belly.
You know. The kind that women of a certain
age begin to show, a pouch of weight below
the navel that resists attempts at flattening.

Apron. As in part of the road where the slow
or damaged pull aside. As in dinner on the table
when the man gets home. As in domestic, tamed.
As in expected to toil and remain unstained.

As in tradition. As in remember your place. It could
be called prosperous. Could be shield. Could be
creator, battlefield, but it needs no label.
A body is a body. A woman already has a name.

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Donna Vorreyer is the author of Unrivered (forthcoming, 2025), To Everything There Is (2020), Every Love Story is an Apocalypse Story (2016) and A House of Many Windows (2013), all from Sundress Publications. Her poetry, fiction, and essay work have appeared in Ploughshares, Cherry Tree, Poet Lore, Salamander, Harpur Palate, Booth, and elsewhere. She lives and creates in the Chicago area and hosts the monthly online reading series A Hundred Pitchers of Honey.