take back the night

For Staceyann Chin



please excuse me i am prone
to bouts of dissociation please
excuse me i am remembering
how to sing how
(she reminds me) it's all
connected
it's all
our business,
his hands in
my sweatpants
my underwear, first friends then
nobody watching
we light fire
from bricks from
brown pine needles
brimstone
curling from a cabin chimney


dark-driving lost and me
the only one who could read a map i trace
contours and projections slide
fingers drown out
the old man's knocking/blankets burning/one of us screamed
go
away

but come
here beside me
here
fingers grasping mouth
to lips finally
too late 
dead in the room
at your parents' house
and our friend watching
and me wishing i'd never wished
to be touched


how many years later
do you think of me?
do you know how i've worked
to kiss hug fuck love
me love
him love 
anyone
do you know
how i've cowered
you were not the last to hit me
how i've torn myself trying
to tear you out
out
my underwear
my sweatpants
my memories
cabins and nighttime
and the morning after
by the riverbank
you picked me flowers


fuck your flowers
this is your legacy
you forget while i tried
to starve
you out of me
to carve
you out of me
with pocketknives and paperclips
all to show
for it: thin white scars

But MY scars.
I rub-hit-starve
my body I reclaim
every inch of me every
means of touching me
I finger-bruise-slice not out but
over you
obliterate your marks so they are
MY marks so I
stand
(see how I am standing)
woman made