Poem for April 10

For today’s prompt, Robert Lee Brewer at Writer’s Digest challenges readers to write a suffering poem. “A person or animal in the poem could be suffering,” Brewer writes. Or, he adds, “The poem itself could be suffering.”

Here’s my response:

Homework assignment

 

She came to class today, hat pulled low over her ears.

 

He pulled her hair out in clumps, she says.

She should never have gone out with him, she says,

When she had a paper due about global food injustice.

She should have known better.

 

This is not the first time it’s happened.

It’s been a pattern since her earliest days;

Men coming in and out of her life like so many jackals stalking their prey,

Waiting for some small unguarded moment that will allow them

To seize the opportunity.

 

She doesn’t say it, perhaps doesn’t see it,

Perhaps is hoping against hope that someone else, finally, will see it.

There is another kind of injustice playing out here;

Something else she could write a paper on,

That is much more pressing than the human-rights abuses

Committed by faceless corporations against nameless multitudes.

 

This is a tyranny that is hers alone to explore,

And I will be asking her to walk across a field of broken glass

That lies deep within her own soul,

To embark on a treacherous journey

That no one ever volunteers to undertake,

And whose destination is far from certain.

 

Write me a paper, I tell her,

In which you tell me what you already know,

But no one has been willing to hear you say.

Tell me, I say,

Because so many have said everything is all your fault,

And you know and I know that it’s not,

Tell me all the reasons why not.

I’m listening. I believe you.

 

And in her eyes, terror and hope.

Her journey begins.

 

 

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A modest proposal

In which we address the problem of yet another misogynistic loudmouth

In the latest instance of a male troglodyte holding forth on the finer social implications of rape, University of Rochester economics professor Steven Landsburg recently penned a brief manifesto on the rape convictions of two high school football players in Steubenville, Ohio, that would make any self-respecting woman-hater’s heart swell with testosterone-laden pride.

In his blog,  Landsburg  asked whether the law should rightfully discourage acts of rape in which the person is unconscious and suffers no direct physical harm.  “As long as I’m safely unconscious and therefore shielded from the costs of an assault,” Landsburg reasons, “why shouldn’t the rest of the world (or more specifically my attackers) be allowed to reap the benefits?”

Groups such as Binders Full of Women and WORD (Women Organized to Resist and Defend) — as well as many students at the university — are outraged and have called for Landsburg’s ouster. The university, in true let’s-protect-the-macho-s*@theads-among-us fashion, has taken a self-righteous stand in support of its  professor and his right to academic autonomy and free speech.

So I have a another solution to propose — and it’s one of which I am certain Landsburg himself would approve, since I am literally taking him at his own word.

So the good U of R doesn’t want to fire him outright? Fine. Then how about we invite Landsburg to the next dorm party, ply him with sufficient drugs and alcohol to render him safely unconscious and therefore shielded from the costs of an assault, and then surgically remove his man parts? After all, why shouldn’t the rest of the world be allowed to reap the benefits?

We won’t even need any sophisticated equipment. A magnifying glass and a pair of tweezers should do just fine.

 

An open letter to anyone outraged by CNN’s reporting on Steubenville

I have a message for everyone who has been protesting CNN’s reprehensible reporting of the Steubenville rape:

Thank you.

While it is likely that CNN will continue to maintain its arrogant, self-justifying stance until (it hopes) the whole thing blows over, I want you to know that your words and your energy have not been spent in vain.

As a rape survivor, I am greatly encouraged by the sheer numbers of you who have weighed in.

You see, I was raped at a time when there was no support for the victim, any victim. I was not drinking. I was not at a party. I was not behaving provocatively. I was a 13-year-old bookworm, the shy, slightly nerdy smart girl, walking home from school in broad daylight with a stack of books in my arms.

Everyone at school knew. Everyone treated it as a joke. Danny and his football buddies, in particular, thought it was hilarious. Teachers and administrators turned a blind eye. Even my own family dismissed it as my own problem, something I would have to deal with myself. It was a lonely road to walk.

So today I am greatly heartened by your very well-placed outrage. I encourage you to keep speaking, even if CNN is too deaf to hear. Others like me hear you loud and clear.

And with every word of outrage you utter against such atrocities, we heal a little inside.

So keep writing. Keep talking. Feel free to forward this message to everyone you know and tell them to keep talking, too.

You are making a difference. You are helping, far more than you know.

God bless you all.

Trust me. No woman loves it.

‎Legitimate rape. Part of God’s will. What will they think of next?

Let me be clear: I have, up to this point, studiously avoided joining in the hostile and rancorous public debate that has characterized the current presidential campaign.  I have listened with growing dismay to the increasingly hostile language that my good friends on either side of the issues hurtle at one another. And, to the extent that I have shared my views, I have held to neutral language, refraining from the fiery rhetoric and name-calling that I have heard issuing from both sides.

Once and for all: rape is an act of violence

But I cannot keep silent in the face of this constant barrage of bizarre declarations about rape from so many Republican candidates in recent months. Rape is never legitimate. Rape is never part of God’s plan to populate the earth.

Rape is never anything but an act of violence and power. Period. Its sole purpose is to dominate, degrade and control. It does not matter whether you knew your assailant before the attack, whether the assault resulted in pregnancy, whether in the heat of the moment it seemed best to acquiesce rather than risk being killed.

And sometimes, you can put up every form of resistance you have in your power, and still it does not stop the rape from happening, and still no one will believe you, and still you will be told that you should have done more, that it is somehow entirely your fault.

And no one is immune

I know because I was stalked, pursued and assaulted by a classmate many years ago, when I was in eighth grade.* Back then, there was no language to correctly identify his actions as acquaintance rape. That kind of awareness was still decades away in the public discourse. Indeed, no one besides me seemed to think there was anything even slightly out of the ordinary in his overtly aggressive, sexually menacing behavior.

The person they criticized, for not being able to “handle it,” was me. A naïve, bookish 13-year-old girl. The class egghead. The shy, nerdy new girl.

In fact, those closest to me blamed me for having been, of all things, “too innocent.” Ironic, isn’t it? Especially when you consider that I had asked virtually every adult in my immediate acquaintance — parents, teachers, school administrators — for help in dealing with the escalating threats from “Dirk” (not his real name).

Not one of them had taken me seriously.

Clearly, the inclination to blame the victim runs deep within our collective consciousness — so much so that we willingly accept the most outlandish theories about rape, rather than face the uncomfortable reality that there are distinct threads of misogyny interwoven throughout our social fabric.

Shocked out of my complacency
This is never an easy or pleasant story to tell. Which is why, over the years, I have grown increasingly reluctant to tell it. It’s so much easier just to keep moving forward and never speak of it.

Besides, because my own recovery was so complete — the result of many years of sifting through the painful details in a support group for women whose horror stories were similar to mine —  it had led me to believe that things had changed.

I became somewhat complacent. Life was good. My children were turning out well. I had achieved many successes in my career. And rarely, if ever, did I have to think about that long-ago event.

Best to leave well enough alone.

But then there came the day in one of my college English classes when a male student — who in many other respects seemed genuinely kind and well-mannered — casually remarked that some women love sexual violence.

“Trust me,” I shot back with some heat. “No woman loves it.”

It reminded me of a similar incident from high school, when my own assault was still painfully fresh in my mind. During a lively class discussion about some topic I have since forgotten, one male classmate who was studious and well-liked suddenly spoke up.

To this day, I can quote him verbatim.

“I hate women who scream rape,” he said. “They all ask for it, anyway.”

Back then, I had no vocabulary to describe what had happened to me, much less to respond to such a remark. I had not the presence of mind to ask him whether that observation included his mother, sisters, grandmothers and aunts. I can’t recall whether anyone else challenged him, either.

All I can remember is those words, and how they stung.

Tell, and keep telling
So while I was glad to be in a position as the professor in my own class not to allow such a remark to pass without comment, it made me realize that I must keep telling my story, however much I’d rather not.

There are so many others out there who still wear blinders.

There are so many others out there who still hold to unbelievably convoluted, logic-defying notions because accepting them is much easier than facing unpleasant truths.

And, there are so many others out there who are still unable to move forward unless someone who has already made the journey to wholeness is willing to light the way.

The good news is that healing and wholeness are possible. In fact, refusing to become permanently damaged is our best hope in triumphing over this particular evil; to rise up, reclaim our dignity, and refuse to be silent. It can be done. Women are doing it all over our country every day. That is what I wish for every woman who has been raped. That is what I hope for every woman who comes to this space and reads these words.

*You can read more details about my experience on my Essays tab here on this site. Click on “Meditations on a Sepia.”