“You Goes to the Gyno” by Jae Nichelle

You Goes to the Gyno

                                                          [in the last days of YOUR health insurance, YOU 
                                                          gets to a doctor’s office. the narrated action 
                                                          occurs silent-movie style, very  dramatic.] 

                                     NARRATOR 
& the Black woman at the front desk asks You Your name,
d.o.b., & how many licks it’ll take You to get to the center  
of this sucker, because inside You’ll find your bill. she asks  
if You’ve ever considered, witnessed, or recently become 
allergic to pregnancy. how long You’ve been Yourself & if 
You is Single, capital S, & if You could be a kind of dessert  
which kind would You be. & why. when You passes these entry 
riddles, You enter the audience & hear humming, akin to the 
beat of Your ticking clock. now Your heart. no one else is 
waiting for their name, only Yours. they’ve come to witness 
You being weighed & measured, recorded, probed. a doctor  
appears—You?—the room silences, all heads turn. when You  
rises, they follow. the doctor asks if You has ever considered,  
witnessed, or recently become allergic to pregnancy. if You has  
been counting Your cheek hairs. if Your mother & father ever  
fought. well…yes, You says. the audience boos in rounds.  
are you happy? her eyeline descends your antipodal knees.  
me, or my vagina? the audience sighs. she winks at them,  
turns her speculum into a microphone, singing to You. 
are you on drugs? if not, why. & which drugs do you  
waaaaant. she spins in her chair as pills shoot from her  
fingers into the audience. the exam table pirouettes with Your  
feet in the stirrups, Your entryway visible & unadorned. she 
examines You in motion, her speculum an injustice. her  
speculum an ex boyfriend. her speculum a speculum.  
there is not enough blood for Your audience, they hide  
Your clothes as you come away leaking. she sings again that  
everything is normal, but Your period must be giving You  
trouble. sure, You agrees, my period is probably giving me  
trouble. have You considered pregnancy? do Your mother  
& father know of Your sex life? what’s in it for them? a chorus  
now. the audience has joined—what’s in it for them! they are  
throwing sucker wrappers & ticking again. someone sticks  
Yours in Your mouth. it’s a sweetness You has been ashamed  
to crave; so childish, that type of want. Your tongue ensnares  
the best part, the middle around the filling, which You must  
bite, only to pull a debt from between your teeth & find  
Your mouth full of tiny shards of glass. 




Appears in Grownfolk Blues: A Musical in Poems (Host Publications 2026)

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Photo Credit: Meaghan Sutton

Louisiana-born Jae Nichelle (she/her) is a nationally recognized slam poetry champion and the author of Grownfolk Blues (Host Publications, 2026), God Themselves (Andrews McMeel, 2023) and the chapbook The Porch (As Sanctuary) (YesYes Books, 2019). Jae is a 2026 Oregon Literary Fellow and a graduate fellow of The Watering Hole. She believes in all of our collective ability to contribute to radical change.

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