Untouchable

My throat feels raw;
My eyes sore and red with tears
Pain flooding out through my face
In all its sad and ugly raging.
You are gone, but not gone.
You're near me now,
But I cannot touch you.
I'll never again reach out and feel you
Warm and sleepy beside me in bed.
Never again will I hold you close;
Our hearts reaching out and entwining in the smallest of gaps
Between our breastbones.
I remember though,
How you lifted your head to look into my eyes -
Yours were deep green, and so tired.
When we sat in the hospital,
Hoping for good news,
There was a baby - squalling loudly in his mother's arms.
He looked just like you.
He was small and frail, newly born,
And you,
Small and frail, soon to close your eyes for all time.
I'm crying now, and fighting not to cry.
I cannot touch you,
But you are here.

American Politicians: Stripping Women of Our Rights

For years, things like abortion have been debated (or more accurately, fought over). Now, basic health precautions are under debate, and some people would like to take those away as well.

• Abortions; to save lives and to terminate involuntary insemination (Read: Pregnancy by Rape).
• Birth Control; to prevent unwanted pregnancies, regulate our hormones, and alleviate cramps and acne.

The problems are going deeper than these issues as well. In Arizona, as many of you know, politicians are trying to get a bill passed that would allow companies to fire women for using birth control to prevent pregnancy (only allowing it if they are using it for other reasons).

Women throughout the country are also in danger of losing their jobs because they ARE pregnant.

Further disturbing is the possibility of women being forced to carry a stillborn or dying fetus to term, or until “natural labor” has occurred, even when carrying the fetus may cause the death of the mother or twin. Rep. Terry England even went so far as to compare women to livestock.

While there are a great many men that are appalled at these bills (and please, DO encourage the men in your life to stand up for the women in theirs), these are women’s issues, and as women, we need to stand and fight; together. A unified front against these violations against our right to have control of our own bodies.

Speaking of body autonomy, some Republican individuals are apparently trying to ensure that the Violence Against Women Act is not reauthorized, or changed so that illegal immigrants can be deported for reporting a crime, such as domestic abuse; members of the LGBT would likewise not be protected and offered services/shelter in the event of abuse.

There will be no White Knight, ladies. We may not be shot at, or thrown in jail, and we still have our rights… For now. Our country is moving towards making we women property again - a state of existence most women in America have not, and SHOULD not experience. Stand up, or be tied down. When making your choice to join hands and fight back, or to sit down and keep quiet, think of this: Do you want your daughters, sisters, mothers, and friends to have their rights stripped from them? To have no choice in matters of their own bodies?

Morning

I awoke with the sun today,
Blinking slowly in disbelief.
So rare it is, for myself,
To watch it rise from the other side of sleep.
The gray sky erupted slowly into
Vivid blue and gold,
And a single glittering ray descended;
A wish, alighting on my face.
I let it fill me, hopeful, and
With wishing,
Dared to dream awake.

The Whoreflower

My role is clear in the
Virgin, Whore dichotomy.
I stand beneath the red lights
in your mind, waiting.
Stop trying to save me.
And, please, stop trying
to enslave me.
Your words are chains,
And my defiance will shatter them,
As you once shattered me.
A lotus,
Splashed with cyanide.
Fractured in the sanguine illumination;
Yet unbroken.

Summer

In the shining August,
Slick with honest sweat,
I lay, chest heaving, on the floor
And smiled to be alive
In spite of you.

Lost

Someday, I'm going to get lost in a strange city. I'll sleep in public bathrooms, and be reminded of the reasons my father is a hero. Maybe I'll look through dumpsters to find things to sell in a pawn shop. During the day, I'll sit calmly on a park bench, letting the sun restore me, and I'll imagine I'm my mother, sitting in her garden; happy to be alive in a world of sunshine.
My clothes will get ragged, and I'll have to wash my hair in a bus station sink. I'll be hungry, but I'll know how to feed myself. It won't be the first time I couldn't eat. Hopefully I'll have a camera, and hopefully it won't get stolen, and I'll take pictures of neon signs and big, strong men carrying their children on their shoulders. I'll want to call my father, because he's a hero.

What is Rape, to me?

What is rape?
To me?
You never even asked this.
A simple creature, undisturbed by
The horrors that did not apply
To your own life.
What is it to me?
Rape is when my love held me down
Whispering words meant to trick me;
Blind me.
Drunk, blessed drunk,
When he took me for the first time.
Rape is when the fear came,
Long before the pain.
Rape is how I felt
In the moments that were
Precursor to my shame.
Rape is what I felt,
When he turned me over, roughly,
And took his liberties with my body,
Tearing my flesh and splashing my blood
Across my own sheets.
Rape is what I felt
When he hit me;
Saw my tears and struck me hard enough
to make my ears ring.
Rape is what I felt
When the man I trusted more than myself
Beat me bloody in my own bed
And told me I was
NOTHING
and no one cared.
Rape is what I felt
When my friends and family ignored
My screams for help.
Rape is what I felt.
And now,
Years later,
I still feel that pain.
Your jokes don't help,
They desensitize and hurt;
They cause me anguish
While you're sitting in your room laughing
at some shallow joke,
I'm here wishing you had a fucking heart
and could, for a moment,
Put yourself in my place
And ask
"Is it funny"?