By Button Poetry
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Blythe Baird, performing at Icehouse in Minneapolis, MN.
Transcript provided by YouTube:
00:02
perhaps this body belongs to the first
00:04
time i was raped
00:06
and i think about how [ __ ] up it is to
00:08
begin a sentence with the first time i
00:10
was raped
00:12
and how when i talk to other women about
00:13
this it almost seems like it’s not even
00:15
if you’ve been assaulted
00:17
but when see women have so much in
00:20
common such as loving zumba
00:23
being interrupted experiencing violence
00:26
and when another male friend turns out
00:28
to be a rapist
00:30
the same male friend who wore feminism
00:32
across his chest like a pageant sash
00:35
i cannot help but remember meeting him
00:37
at a sexual violence prevention
00:39
rally in the disappointing irony
00:42
and when another male friend who
00:43
identifies as a feminist gives himself
00:45
permission to make a rape joke and has
00:47
the nerve to call it reclamatory
00:49
never mind that his joke just validated
00:51
the actions of the silent predator
00:53
sitting next to him never mind that the
00:55
joke
00:55
just made a survivor sitting across from
00:57
him relive what was likely the worst
00:59
thing to ever happen to them
01:01
and you men who pose as activists
01:03
scratch your head
01:04
wonder why women are so terrified to
01:06
report while you shrug your shoulders
01:08
and make our trauma into your victory
01:11
lap the reason
01:12
you fist bump your friends over craft
01:14
beers at the bar
01:15
how could i expect this body to be
01:17
perfect for anything but the punchline
01:21
and if i do not laugh i am no longer the
01:24
cool girl
01:25
but the one who cannot take a joke i
01:28
have run
01:28
out of compassion for wolves i have run
01:31
out of compassion for anyone who isn’t
01:33
outraged
01:34
i ran in this stubborn body followed
01:37
i am the opposite of forgiveness i am
01:40
all rage and shriek in flame
01:42
outside of the women’s freshman
01:43
dormitory at yale fraternity pledges
01:46
chanted no means yes
01:47
yes means anal i [ __ ] dead women and
01:50
fill them with my semen
01:51
a woman is found unconscious behind a
01:53
dumpster pine needles in her hair
01:56
naked wounded violated by a star
01:58
stanford athlete meanwhile
02:00
the press is more concerned with how
02:02
this experience has taken away her
02:04
assailant’s
02:05
appetite this is not to say
02:08
all men are hungry this is not even to
02:12
say
02:12
all men are hunting but haven’t we all
02:15
found the bones of a woman stuck like
02:18
leftovers between a full man’s teeth
02:21
there is a fraternity in minnesota that
02:23
paints the stone lions
02:25
outside their front door the color of
02:27
the panties of the last girl they
02:28
successfully assaulted
02:30
you call this rape culture i call it
02:32
this morning [ __ ] i was cackled four
02:35
times on the way
02:36
here if my trauma were made into an art
02:39
museum
02:40
the most popular exhibit would showcase
02:42
portraits of every man who ever
02:44
assaulted me snarling and the smell of
02:46
his sweat on my pillowcase follows me to
02:48
sociology
02:49
and the whole class can tell that most
02:51
days i am more victim than i am survivor
02:54
and in this room
02:55
i try to write a poem about anything
02:56
other than my Sbut all
02:58
that comes out
02:59
is my throat in his hands
03:02
hours before one of my best friends
03:04
raped me on our college campus
03:07
we discussed the prospect of astral
03:09
projection
03:10
he couldn’t understand why i wanted to
03:12
experience it so badly
03:15
why would anyone want to leave their
03:17
body he laughed
03:19
and in this moment we had nothing in the
03:22
world in common
03:32
you
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This post was previously published on YouTube.
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Photo credit: Screenshot from video