Things I Learned From Her

My Struggle

Sometimes words aren't enough.
The only other girl at the party
is ranting about feminism.
The audience: a sea of rape jokes, snapbacks, red cups and me.
They gawk at her mouth like it is a drain clogged with too many opinions. I shoot her an empathetic glance and say nothing. This house is for wallpaper women. What good
is wallpaper that speaks?
I want to stand up, but if I do, whose coffee table of silence
will these boys rest their feet on?

These boys...
I want to stand up, but if I do,
what if someone takes my spot?
I want to stand up, but if I do,
what if everyone notices I've been
sitting this whole time? I am ashamed of keeping my feminism in my pocket until it is convenient, like at poetry slams or woman's rallies. There are days I want people to like me more than I want to change the world. Once I forgave a predator because I was afraid to start drama in our friend group, not two weeks later he assaulted someone else.
I'm still carrying the guilt in my purse.

There are days I forget we had to invent nail polish to change color in drugged drinks, apps to virtually walk us home, lipstick shaped mace and underwear designed to prevent rape.

Once a man behind me at an escalator shoved his hand up my skirt from behind and no one around me said anything, so I didn't say anything. Because I didn't wanna make a scene.

How am I to forgive myself for doing nothing in the mouth of trauma? Is silence not an act of violence too?

Once, I told a boy I was powerful and he told me to mind my own business. "You think you can take over the world?" And I said "No, I just want to see it. I just need to know it is there for someone, that someone can control this mess"

Once, my dad informed me sexism is dead and reminded me to always
carry pepper spray in the same breath. We accept this state of constant fear as just another component of being a girl. We text each other when we get home
safe and it does not occur to us that not all of our guy friends have to do the same. You could literally saw a woman in half and it would still be called a magic trick.
Wouldn't it?
That's why you invited us here, isn't it? Because there is no show without a beautiful assistant?
We are surrounded by boys who objectify us. We are the daughters
of men who warned us about the news and the missing girls on the milk carton and the sharp edge of the world. They begged us to be careful. To be safe. Then told our brothers to go outside and play.

-For survivors