Poem by a woman whose friend was raped (Powerful!)

DON’T WRITE A POEM ABOUT RAPE
by Julie Buffaloe-Yoder (Reprinted here with Julie's permission. Thanks, Julie!)
For the editor who told me rape is not a fresh subject (he knows who he is).
Rape is a cliché.
Unless it happens to you.
But don’t write a poem about it
or the editor might say
it’s just not fresh.
Rape is not fresh.
It’s been done too much.
It’s too emotional, confessional.
There are too many words.
People are not shocked anymore.

Don’t write a poem about it
especially if you were in the dark
university parking lot, a little more than tipsy,
and he forced you into his car with a gun.
Dark parking lots and guns are so overdone!
Don’t write a poem about it
especially if the digital time on his dash
was 12:00. It’s too much like the Twilight Zone
especially if those stiff red numbers
still ring in your brain sometimes
when you’re in the grocery line
and you drop everything you got, and the tomatoes
and the peaches, and the can of cream corn
go rolling down the aisle.

Don’t say he drove you down a dead end road.
Don’t tell how he bent your fingers back,
slammed them with the door over and over.
How heavy-handed can you get?
Don’t tell how he took the right to bare your arms,
your legs, your goose-bumpy little nipples,
and when he ripped your shirt in loud red shreds
you were trite enough to worry
what people would think about you.

For God’s sake, don’t say you were a virgin.
Honey, save it for the Movie of the Week.
Don’t tell about the fistfuls
of sand and gravel in your open mouth,
your open face, up your open legs.
It’s just not fresh.
Maybe try a different point of view.

Don’t tell how he held the gun so tenderly
in your ear, under your tongue,
deep inside the stretched-out skin
of your nostril, and you could smell the click
as he cocked it, and you could taste the click
in your throat as he made you call him Lord.
With the right music, it might work for a porno flick
but not for a literary journal.

Don’t tell how you looked up at the full moon
with its mouth torn into a little o
as you waited for it to be over.
Don’t you know the moon is overused?
And there are inconsistencies if you say
you almost laughed out loud
cause you were a stupid little twit who thought
who actually believed the first time would be romantic.

Don’t write a poem about it. Just don’t.
Especially if you went crazy when it didn’t end
and the only defense you had was to black out
and dream the damnedest dreams about a book
you used to have when you were a girl
and you dreamed a little song about the silvery moon,
the moon on the breast of the new fallen road
the Carolina moon that kept shining, shining,
shining on the one who’s raping you.
And when you woke up, it wasn’t over
but the Goodnight Moon was gone,
and you saw an old woman in the distance
come out on her porch to hear
what all the Hell raising was about,
turn out the light and go back inside
and you might’ve thought Good Night
to the Old Lady Whispering Hush,
but that’s too obvious, and anyway
we’ve heard that story before.

Don’t say he dragged you down the road by your hair,
the gravel chewing your back to bits.
Good Night Bowl of Mush, it’s just
the caveman syndrome. Get over it.
We’re sick of wenchy women poets
who are always bashing men.

And the part where he was gentleman enough
to drive you back to your dorm
just doesn’t fit the character.
Don’t say he told you he’d kill you if you breathed
a word, then asked your forgiveness, told you
not to worry and go get some sleep.
Would he really say that?

Don’t say he drove off in a limp line of smoke
as the sun came blinking over the horizon
and you staggered and puked your way back to your room,
knowing you wouldn’t make it to Psychology class that day.
Don’t talk about the guilt for not turning him in.
Take your ass to a talk show or a support group or a priest,
stop throwing the reader around.

Don’t tell the never ending end
of your whiny little poem. Get a grip.
Especially if your roommate laughed and said
Why would anybody want to rape you?
And the counselor said you’ve got to take control
of your life, and your boyfriend tried to understand
why even his understanding would never be enough,
why even his softest fingertips would always be too much.
So you drank yourself into a quiet rage
and now six years later it’s backed up in a corner
of your throat, bristling, sideways, ready to lunge
at the thickest, closest, slickest, hardest vein.

Nobody wants to hear about it anymore.
And the editor doesn’t care that
you’ve already cut half the words
and many of the details.
It’s still too sprawling, too baggy,
too talky, not fresh.
Go tell it to Ginsberg, we’ve
got a comma to perfect.

But if you’re that damned stubborn, go ahead.
You’ll write the poem alone
and it’ll live in a junk drawer
swelling up like a belly
under a pink pile of rejection.
Serves you right.
So stop acting like a bitchy female poet.
It just won’t work. It’s just not fresh.

Death Penalty for Child Rapists...Inhumane?

Today, a good friend e-mailed me about the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court to declare the death penalty for child rapists "unconstitutional", because they find it "cruel and unusual" to kill someone for raping a child. One of the prisoners whose death penalty was set aside as a result of the decision had received the sentence for raping his eight-year-old stepdaughter. At first, my reaction to my friend's news was, "Isn't that the most F-d up thing you've ever heard? I can't believe they're not going to kill those monsters!"

But then, I realized something-- and it surprises me as much as it would surprise most people who know me, because when it comes to children being abused, I am an emotionally-charged loud-mouth. I'm a teacher in my day job, and I consider myself not only their educator, but their advocate, as well. Ask anybody I work with, and they'll confirm that I am one of those Mama-type teachers who loves her students-- who truly, deeply, cares about KIDS. Thing is, I get steamed when I hear about ANY child being abused, because I know what it's like to be in the position of victim. I know what it's like to be waiting for the dawn.

That's part of what makes me such a pissed-off person. Language that would make a sailor blush comes pouring forth from my mouth when I even think about the kind of people who are able to live with themselves day-after-day, knowing what they have done or are doing to children whose innocence they have stolen. They just, quite simply, don't give a shit. It's that simple.

So, how pissed off am I that the Supreme Court knocked the legs out from under the state of Louisiana's right to kill unredeemable people? Well... I'm not sure how I feel about it, and I told my friend just that, in a follow-up e-mail to my profanity-laced first-response.

See, I live in Texas-- and, if you pay any attention to the death penalty, you know that Texas has a track record of executing a lot of people. Our esteemed (cough-cough-- sorry, I threw up in my mouth a little bit) president, "Duh-B-Ya", started the execution-ball rolling to the extent it does, when he was inflicting his inadequate leadership skills only on Texas, instead of the U.S.A. and the World. (Sorry, World. I didn't vote for him, if that makes you any less disgusted that I am a Texan.)

I love my state. It's a cool place to live. But not because of the death penalty. It's not something I'm proud of, because, frankly, Texas is so bad at making sure that only those who are guilty get executed. That's why I am grateful that things like The Innocence Project exist.

As a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, my rage toward my perpetrator cannot be adequately expressed with something as impersonal as a blog. To even attempt to put it in the context of a blog-- of someone just happening upon a blog entry and reading all about my rage-- would trivialize the depth of the scars I bear. I am telling you that so you will understand just how completely the death of my perpetrator would not break my heart. Got that? Moving on.
The problem I have with the death penalty is the number of people who are convicted, then end up being found innocent through DNA testing. I mean, is there a way that a death sentence-- that is, a person being found guilty and sentenced to death-- could be absolutely fool-proof? Error-proof? Human-proof?

Er, well, not as long as there are humans in charge of figuring it all out, huh?

So, where is the justice for people who have been sexually abused? That's a question I am addressing in the sequel to Courage in Patience, a story of hope for those who have endured abuse. Hope in Patience will try to figure that out-- but here's what I know so far: justice for children who are raped or sexually abused is not going to be found in a court of law. It's just not.
Mm--m--m--m--maybe the Supreme Court is right in striking down the death penalty in this case-- but, to be honest with you, I think it needs to be struck down in any case-- (again, I'm just as surprised as you, to see those words coming up on my screen, with my fingers at the keyboard)-- -until we can have an absolute guarantee that the person found guilty was absolutely the guilty party.

"But it's a deterrent!" people will say.
I seriously doubt that having the death penalty hanging over his head will make even one perpetrator think twice. That would require caring. And, frankly, in my experience, that's just not something those type of people are good at.