The Elephants

ALTERNATE UNIVERSE IN WHICH I DECIDE TO STAY SOBER WHILE PLAYING CLUE WITH MY FRIEND AND A FRIEND OF HIS

Even as we joke about turning the game
into something else: not Professor
Plum take off your shirt. I keep my clothes on.
I keep the hallway light on as we slip into sleep
and I am more aware of my body awake,
slowly tensing as his relaxes onto mine
even when I say no & I don’t stop saying no.
I am less confused & more sure that this man,
this friend of my friend is not going
to stop until he is finished. His hands hold me
like rope in the conservatory and I blame myself
in this universe too. I wonder
what I could have done different here
to make him listen: worn longer sleeves,
held fast to a candlestick,
played Monopoly instead.

---

EMDR SESSION 4: I TELL MY HUSBAND I THINK I WAS RAPED

Though he wasn’t my husband then,
he says what were you thinking,
how could you,
asked if I sucked his dick.

---

EMDR SESSION 4: I REMEMBER MY FRIEND WAS AWAKE

or awoken by the mantra of struggle & body & no.
Shut-up he said fucking trying to sleep.
Thin, long fingers held my mouth carefully silent,

not that I had anything more to say.

---

ONCE I WAS A MERMAID

first the man slathered me with cooking fat
bound my hands to my chest
sprinkled salt & white pepper
stuffed my mouth with halved-lemon wrapped in netting

laid me gently on the pyre—a pillow just so for my head to keep my hair from the flame

the man stroked me with garlic-butter

flipped me after ten minuteshigh heat to sear the flesh

the flesh turning the flame fuchsia & turquoise & silver
the flesh turning more & more fish

and though this body was also once
half-human
half-god’s-own-image

I end upgrilled
naked
slit open &
skewered

on the fork of a hungering man

---

What a Body Learns

It’s not as simple as yes because yes
I like it—flicking and swirling—
complicated licking from perineum to clit
around
but my body remembers

and clenches my thighs—and I
feel every fiber of carpet, every speck
of dust remembering what my mind
told my mind to forget. That once a man

rubbed up next to me and though I pulled
no, and my body told him no,
he started licking me wet for him.
I prayed to my body
that it have mercy but it opened

for him—an oiled locket.
My eyes and hands closed.
The insides of my knees pressed
deep to his ribs.
I still felt his smirk

as I came, as it swept
over me as he lifted his body to enter


a body I was no longer fighting.

And now I tell my body to relax,
I tell my body there is light, it is day,
and I tell my body that I like your
soft black mess of hair, your safe tongue.
I tell my body that it does not need
to be afraid, but what body ever listens.