at six he pushed me down the stairs of the playground and
while i sat there, hands wrapped around my injury,
i was granted the crucifix by which we tame girls at a young age -
a soundbite that ate me:
“he’s only doing it to get a rise out of you.”
a rise, here meaning a reaction, here meaning,
don’t make a scene, it lets him win, here meaning
make no retaliation, let him keep playing, sit there and force
every howl you feel building in yourself
down into a whimper,
wipe your nose and limp back home
at sixteen i was already familiar with this concept of sinking,
of submission by point of silence,
where i would weigh in one hand my safety and in the other hand, burning,
the sheer rage i chewed on every time a boy whispered things that
belonged only inside a bedroom
“he’s only doing this to get a rise out of you,” here meaning,
a boy can’t be a bully, here meaning flirting looks like abuse,
here meaning - let him run his wild hands all over you,
do not cower, it will only lead him on, do not fight back, that’s
slutty too
at twenty i was a raging feminist asshole, couldn’t just make friends,
couldn’t just slink in and out of parties, would start fights with frat boys
about shit they should know but turn their cheeks from,
would be kicked out and snapchatted and called crazy because
i asked them to their faces if you knew what he did
why didn’t you say anything
and while i watched these same people cross stages at graduation
flip me off
and then keep going
i was reminded to be the feminine emotional mess aka
no emotions at any point, ever showing, for fear
they might be conceived of as inappropriate
“he’s just doing this to get a rise out of you”
because he knows you won’t cry without being told you’re overemotional
and you won’t yell because ladies aren’t loud and you
won’t speak out because then you lose in both ways, don’t you;
he won when he hurt you and you, stupid girl,
you lost when you actually felt it
at twenty five i am exhausted, can’t see the light, am sipping
on the drink i don’t want at a house party that’s too pretentious
listening to white boys debate things they’ll never be a part of
and the trial comes up because it’s gotta - and you know how it goes
because you’ve been here before,
the sliding in of a devil’s advocate, that sleek smile, that bitter on their lips, that
victorious well i think he’s innocent, boy as heroic, like we asked for it, like we
deserve this, like he’s blessing us with a wisdom we had somehow missed,
like we should be thanking him, like - oh, everybody, move over and let
this man say things we’ve all heard before;
later, my panic attack is subsiding. i think it was his comment,
“if she was drunk, she should have seen it coming,” but i can’t
pinpoint it. things like this happen to me now. sometimes it is like dew,
sometimes it is flood. i am shaking on the floor of a bathroom. my friend
is petting my hair. we are gently talking around a subject.
one of his friends peeks into the room. passes me a warm cider.
assures me, “he’s just doing it to get a rise out of you.”
i am twenty and he puts his hands on me.
i am sixteen and he puts his hands on me.
i am six and he puts his hands on me. my knee is torn open.
getting a rise - here meaning: to cause pain. to incite to bleed.
siriuslylily