I plan out my words to him like a poem
hoping he'll notice they were plucked just for him
like my eyebrows
and ***** hair
please adore my presentation
and I'll lay silent and bare

“You look like my daughter”
The man says to me,
As he’s ordering me a drink
Looking my body up and down.

I laugh,
Look away,
Try to pretend he didn’t say that

Oh but don’t worry
He made it a point
to mention
T H R E E
              M O R E
                           T I M E S
how my body
Resembled his daughters,
“Tight, perfect, the right kind”

Oof.
Idk y’all
Idk that I can do this.
I walk away
I dont make that money.
Even though I know **** well,
I fit his ****** up fantasies.

Not to mention I’m triggered,
Thanks to my childhood trauma,
By all of this conversation,
But it doesn’t really matter
Anyways.
Just a product of my environment
Just an object to fill
The desires
Of hungry eyes.

**** it
Let me be
An empty *** doll.
Just take my intelligence with you please.
Flowers for Algernon ,
And I’m wilting.
I’m too aware of my place in society.

Why strive to peruse my education,
When I know no one will hire me
Because of my background?
Why stay sober,
When my ******* flashbacks
Only stop when I’m drunk?

I hate my life.
No I don’t like the job I have;
But this **** ain’t easy.

And none of it is my fault.
It isn’t.
None of my trauma is my fault.

At least At the end of the day
I have the comfort
Of knowing,
That I matter just as little as the next person.
My life,
In all of its glory,
matters just as little as john f Kennedy’s
I am nothing
And we are nothing

Our suffering is eternal

Why is it that
I am held to a standard set in stone
That you are able to treat like a mold

Why is it that
I am punished for not acting “lady-like”
Yet you are excused because “boys will be boys”

Why is it that
When I was a girl, I wasn’t strong enough to lift a chair
Because you, were the “strong boy” my teacher required

Why is it that
I am trained in passivity
While you are praised for being actively inquisitive

Why is it that
As I speak out, I am obnoxiously bossy
But as you speak out, you are a heroic leader

Why is it that
When insulting me, I’m a *****
But when insulting you, you are just a son of that *****

Why is it that
I can’t speak my truth because that would be emasculating
But you are entitled to, because your truth actually has value

Why is it that
—for the same action—
I am spat out, left ruminating in a puddle of self-doubt
While you are uplifted and encouraged

And, why is it that
I've internalized all of these messages, absorbing the ramifications
While you are able to effectively maneuver them, benefiting off of my downfall

Why is it that, now
I reflexively utter “sorry,” coating my rhetoric to please you

Why is it that, now
I instantaneously tell you, “no, it's ok” when
it isn't. ok.

Why is it that, now
When an adult man catcalls me, a teenage girl
I am taught that is my obligation to indulge him, be kind
So I am not further harassed


And, tell me, why is it that
I am taught to compromise my needs
To fulfill yours

With velveteen curtains and a table of gold
sat an old hag with stories untold.
Kids scurried along the marble path
as they escaped her ferocious shihtzu dog.
Filthy men passed one-liners
about her polished growl.
She played hoarse music on her platinum harp
and sang along verses of outcasts’ tarp.
She read out loud stories
banned by the elders in the ancient market.
She lured and polluted little children’s minds
with her ideas and little schemes.
Yet the townsfolk let that damsel stay,
for she was an old hag who could do magic.
With their minds did the magic play.
The populace attempted to play with her tragic
mind in the hope that they could do magic too.

It was as though he’d touched me with cut,
bloodied palms.

His hands on my skin stung him
and marked me.

I carried the blame for being pretty
but salty.