Denisse M. Cotto Reyes – Boy [Video]

By Button Poetry

A Semi-Finalist from the 2020 Button Poetry video contest.
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Transcript provided by YouTube (unedited)

0:06
boy
0:07
my body is not your home you are a guest
0:11
i make lemonade i offer you tea
0:14
put down the window shade so you can
0:16
sleep share my
0:18
cookies put your feet up
0:21
offer you comfort however
0:25
you will not be comfortable enough to
0:26
make me uncomfortable in my space
0:29
the hair on my legs will stay until i
0:32
decide to shave
0:34
decide the type of beauty i want to walk
0:35
in today this
0:37
is all my you can’t handle that cane
0:42
the generational rape rituals in your
0:43
veins scream when we own ourselves
0:46
you have no power over us patriarchy
0:50
misogyny have lynched us enough it
0:53
doesn’t fit in my space you’re taking up
0:56
too much space you’re always taking
0:58
taking
0:59
taking from us long to be generous boy
1:02
stop gentrifying our bodies like it’s
1:04
your territory to invade
1:06
impose exploitation
1:09
how dare you tell me when it’s right to
1:11
touch me don’t
1:12
touch me the way people can’t touch my
1:16
hair but want to
1:17
men can’t touch my body don’t touch me
1:22
this is my home my vulva looks pretty as
1:25
i see
1:26
fit hair or no hair it still makes you
1:29
moan
1:30
hair or no hair we multiply orgasms
1:34
bleed once a month without dying magical
1:37
we birthed you you’re half women
1:40
boys insist they know how to make women
1:42
beautiful men give us space to define it
1:44
without them
1:45
we don’t need you at the dinner table
1:48
you’ve left us
1:49
bare stuck the meat from my bones
1:52
left the starving scraping at the bones
1:55
breaking wishbones to make you come back
1:57
to make you come back
1:59
left us desperate when our children ask
2:02
for you
2:03
excuse me if we don’t trust your
2:05
offerings
2:06
the growls and saliva dripping at your
2:08
jaw aren’t going to scare me
2:10
your unchecked aggression
2:12
self-mutilation to change my mind ain’t
2:14
going to work
2:15
on me patriarchy hates the woman in you
2:18
trying to chew all that’s feminine
2:20
didn’t say you’re chewing on yourself
2:22
go to your room we don’t forgive you
2:24
anymore eat boy
2:26
eat your thoughts away don’t look for us
2:27
to speak better at night
2:29
like to make women disappear kidnap our
2:32
voices from the room replace us with
2:34
your ideals and fantasies
2:36
wishing you can call to say you’re sorry
2:39
i see you crying at night when no one is
2:42
watching
2:43
i see you having sex with your new
2:46
victim trying to conceive the child you
2:48
killed inside of me i see you
2:53
wake up honey bear
2:56
finish my lemonade vomit the cookies i
3:00
gave you
3:02
put your feet down i said put your feet
3:05
down
3:06
here drink this acid
3:10
let it burn that dirty dirty tongue do
3:12
you regret the insults now
3:15
does it hurt do you know how it feels
3:19
now baby
3:22
you have overstayed your welcome
3:25
leave die
3:50
you

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This post was previously published on YouTube.

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From The Good Men Project on Medium

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