Permission to Speak
Lorraine Grund
The way my body remembers
to keep a soft extra layer of flesh,
to wear pants not skirts
it leaves no chance of being robbed
again of innocence already stolen
or of being painted with bruises
the slow progression
of blue purple brown
the final yellow,
and I’ve given myself permission
to speak now,
of the man, neighbor of my childhood,
and the innocence he took from me,
he said he’d kill me if I told anyone
to the young girl in my class
her pain her posture her poetry like mine
letting her tears fall
and now I cry for her
not me
and I’ve given myself permission
to speak now
of the booze that didn’t help,
that didn’t erase the hand-prints
left on my broken mind,
the bottles that I threw out and shattered
like the glass in my car’s backseat
a fourteen-year-old boy crashed
his big gotta-show-I’m-a-man-now Bronco into,
the shattered glass everywhere
but not where my daughter sat
and I believe in something
I couldn’t believe in before
that I’ve been given a second chance
by someone or some thing
and I’ve given myself permission
not to believe in the god
of the people whose eyes are clouded
with righteous-winged hate
and can’t see the bloody hanger
by their dying daughter
who needed permission
their daughter dying of shock
so that they wouldn’t have to
or the boy with bleeding wrists
because they called him a faggot
and he was their son
and I’ve given myself permission
not to listen to my father,
who says I should get married
and I don’t care
if an ancient book or
the state of Texas says that
I must obey my husband
or else or else
he has the right to rape me
and I say
no thanks
here’s your ring
and I’ve given myself permission
to speak of the pain
of the injustice
of the truth
that finds me in between
the lines of this poem,
and to forgive
the transgressions of others
but never to forget
lest others, like the girl in my class
may suffer the same
pain and injustice in silence.
And the courage I’ve found to speak
is from the knowledge that
the silence is the only thing that can kill me.
