I’m running,

I’m running fast away from him.

He’s getting closer,

He’s getting closer to me again.

There’s blood on my leg,

It leaks from my open flesh.

I’m adrift in a stream of consciousness made of tears, blood, and sweat—

Sweat that’s dripping from my brow into my eyes.

 

It stings.

I scream.

 

The noise is gone.

I’m lost in the muddled babel, shell shocked from the war.

The war on my body.

                                    The war on my brain.

                                                The war on my heart.

My soul.

My being.

My life.

My…

 

                 Sister.

                 My mother.

                 My aunt.

                 My best friend from home.

                 My grandmother.

                 My gender.

 

I thought I was alone.

This can’t be something ordinary.

But I am in wounded company.

And we are the victims of centuries.

Centuries and centuries of being soundless.

Of being named

 

tramp

        skank

floozy

       whore

                bimbo

                          slut

                                                 bitch

                                                          cunt

 

 

When the only thing we want to be called by is our names.

My name that makes me, not a means to an end, but a person.

A person who has a voice.

A voice that will not be silenced.

A woman.

A woman loved by a man,

Who calls her by her name and makes love to her soul.

Where she is safe.

 

I put my torn out pieces back inside myself.

I patch up my torn flesh.

I drink, filling my dry corpse up.

I eat, decorating my bones with fresh wet skin.

I put the puzzle pieces back together in my brain.

I wash my body and I’m reborn.

 

I am here.

I will not be broken.

I will never be silent.