The world consumes its women,

And claims it must to keep families whole:

Babies and governments feed on them;

Religions, traditions rely on them---

Their silent assent, their free labor spent,

Their willingness to look away, pretend

they have intrinsic value to a globe of men

sucking the marrow from female souls.

 

 

What is rape to a woman,

Given her gruesome ‘everyday’?

Around the whole world,

She wears abuse like her second skin,

Not fully human, not fully free,

Owned and traded, taken and degraded.

Where should a sane woman’s outcry begin?

 

Is it so different, the violent touch,

From the baby girl of fifteen or such

Given in ‘marriage’ to a much older man?

Or married to someone she’s never met?

Given no choice, no voice or consent?

Is it so strange—that’s what families do—

That strangers and gangs should join in, too?

As below, so above:

Amazing the world still speaks of ‘love’!

 

Sovereign? Safe? 

Please, what is that?

She was in the wrong place.

She was at the wrong time.

She wore sinful clothes.

She had a sweet face.

She must have ‘asked for it’—

They say all women victims do.

Rape reasonable and customary

Is patriarchy’s constancy—

Never to die?

                      You must ask men why.

 

 

By Professor  Carole R. Fontaine