sexual harassment
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Parents, teach your daughters.
Don't let them walk through life
Like this broken girl before you.
Who did not know her rights to leave,
To let that word, No, so bitter on her tongue, pass through her lips.
Older?
How did I know that I was older?
When I could no longer walk alone,
Without a grown man’s shadow hanging over my shoulder.
Feet a size ten with a height slightly over five,
I danced without passion,For I could not show passion as I did not belong here,I could not bear the gazes piercing me,I sang and twirled with my eyes shut,
The haze
Thats how it starts
Blurry days
She doesn’t know how to part
The bottle in her hand is her savior
She cant take back the memories of fear
She couldn’t control her behavior
Speak Up, Speak Out
silence is emptiness
emptiness left by our own inaction
inaction leads to no where
Speak Up, Speak Out
nothing said is nothing done
why wait years
Speak Up, Speak Out
Ate my words,I'd lost them.It was the boy who wastoo lanky,too small,too young,too pureand probably too much the theatre teacher's sonto harass me.
I’ve always worn sweaters in the summertime
No matter if cloudy or skies full of shine
Sweating down my back, I smiled like I knew it
Was cool. Walking alleys, crossing streets, Neutral, just to get through it.
It’s supposed to be a fun night
Dancing with friends
Hitting on strangers
Having a little too much to drink
Hello world,
I'm living in fear.
He won’t stop.
Escaping, Hiding.
Again and Again.
Reporting, Ignoring.
Running scared.
Another black man is killed
Another trans kid commits suicide
Another woman is sexually harassed
Aren't we just statistics
In the sadistic game of life?
It's not the same, he says.
It's not worth the same fight,
it doesn't mean the same thing,
it doesn't hurt the same way.
Except every now and again I hear
a man yelling after me, I'm a bitch,
#MeToo
for every time her hair wrapped my fingers,
and her body hugged the cold rim of the toilet,
because you decided
she wasn’t drunk enough.
#MeToo,
for all the accidental grazes,
I cannot sleep for saddness
nor for ill thoughts
I cannot sleep for grief in my heart and pain in my mind
There is a sickness in my drumming on my skull
NO NO NO
played over again
He told me I was “pretty” as he brushed my bangs back.
He told me I should be “his” as he wrapped his arm around me tightly.
Cute, right?
Cheyann Washington_ connections / humanities
Is it okay?
Is it okay to call me out of my name?
Like baby, Lil mama
Screaming for my attention
The Irony in Having the Name “Hope”
H.C.
My name is Hope and I may be white
But that does not mean that I am blind
To the violence
To the discrimination
My generation has been bred into stupidity
A government issue codependency
High on freedom then drowning in debt
I still can’t balance a checkbook yet
It’s that punched in the stomach about to throw up stressed out kind of feeling
That way they looked at you made your skin crawl kind of feeling
That kiss you never saw coming and by the time you realized what was happening
Jumping from my car
I grab at stuff spilling away from my grasp
And I do my best to avoid the unmake-upped gaze
That undoubtedly would appear in the rearview
In a half jog
I pass a middle-aged man
No
Doesn't mean
Try to change my mind
Or try again.
It doesn't mean
Repharase the question,
Or
Tell me come on.
It doesn't mean pressure me
By saying it's been a month
Dear boy with the alluring smile,
Thank you for taking away my trust once again:
My body is not my own.
As my 18th birthday approaches, so does my entry into adulthood
As does my loss of agency.
My value as a person will rest on how sexually appealing I seem
My hard work?
My morals?
I am Seven and I am at theClass lunch table with my crushHe never explained to me what sexWas but he talked about it anAwful lot and before he asked meIf I would have sex with him which I
In this body
I feel nothing but lust
A single touch or look
Will give me a rush
I won't care for you tmrw
I won't dream of you tonight
In this big frightening world
Lives a lonely closed off girl
Though that’s only how she feels
The pain seems so real
To walk around everyday
And to feel as if there is no true way
People ask why I'm terrified of snakes, never touching them,
Why I will never be too close to them, so I tell them why.
He appears weak on the outside.
Slow on the legside.
And smiles on the faceside.
His mind is still capable
Of what?
I dont't know.
Finally my ears hear what he thinks.
