This is to the men calling me paranoid:
Every single catcall feels like someone is
using a rusty razor to peel my skin off.
I get tired telling myself to just look forward
and not react while the honk of a car is
tearing through my ears. I beg for them
not to stop, I beg for them to keep driving,
I beg for them not to turn the car around
and try to get me inside and try to get inside of me.
Do you know that the words spoken about
our body and what should be done to it
tears through us like fire through ice?
If we walk the streets at night and someone
comes too close to us, someone tries to take
advantage of us we hear their voices already:
“It was her fault. She shouldn’t walk alone at night”
As if we weren’t free, as if the word female doesn’t
come with any dignity, as if being born with a vagina
makes us inferior, as if we shouldn’t be scared of a
society where rape culture is a thing, a trending
Twitter topic of the week.
This is to the men calling me paranoid: Why did your
kind give me a reason to be like this?