Rape Myths: A Poem **trigger warning**

Miscommunication

He walked her home
after dinner and cocktails,

that night,

stacks of meat were sold
the choicest cuts of beef,

a saturday night celebration
and she collected herself back from the aerial distance
past the pieces of her limbs, her name dark

as the space between street lamps,
and slipped by a street preacher
whose signage pointed to the
gape of her buttons; He assigned
yellow tape to the plunge and
climb of her blouse and skirt: didn’t she know
the parts beneath fabric were all her fault?

(just by their existence
spare parts with no
more continuity than a Picasso)

He said go home, honey,
go inside
you’ll be safer there

among friends

now when she is
shoved in line sometimes,

or when a guy in an office
or a guy with a name tag
or a guy with a badge gives her
(or her tits) a number

she still thinks of
bullhorns, strong arms,
ubiquitous skin

the syntax
of the headlines
ruled the thing

laryngitis,

a wrestling match
between friends,

she did resist;
at least, she thinks she did,
contemplating a wilting white rose
poised for the trash can;

it was all louder than she thought

later He swore: “I’m not a carnivore!
How should I have known
she was the bait and switchblade
arbiter of swiftly
slamming doors?”

He accused her
of a broken no(se)

and she spilled his six drinks
all over his alibi

her voice just made no cents
a wet dollar bill
in an ancient barter system

between friends