What I Want To Be

The rape joke is that you were eight. The rape joke is that at the time, you didn’t know people had sex to express love. The rape joke is that the only other person who’d seen you naked was your mom. The rape joke is that he called you ‘beautiful’ first. The rape joke is that he held your hands together and told you to ‘try harder’ when you struggled. The rape joke is that you believed him when he told you were overreacting. The rape joke is that your grandma called him a nice boy and asked him to stay for dinner. The rape joke is that he winked at you when you apologized to your parents for not coming downstairs the first time you were called. The rape joke is that his friends high-fived him for “getting some.” The rape joke is that you still don’t feel like you’ve regrown the pieces he stole. The rape joke is that he was conceived when his dad slapped himself into his snoring mother. The rape joke is that her friends told her she was lucky someone wanted her. The rape joke is that each year in the United States, 32,000 other women’s bellies ripen with life against their will. The rape joke is that he never learned to touch without scarring. The rape joke is that your classmate thinks ‘have you seen what asses look like in yoga pants?’ is an argument. The rape joke is your new boyfriend kissing you and telling you he ‘raped’ his math test. The rape joke is that ‘Why are girls so scared of rape? Y’all should feel pride that a guy risked his life in jail just to fuck you’ is a popular Tweet right now. The rape joke is that you wake up to the memory of him laughing, “now that wasn’t so bad, was it?” The rape joke is that it’s been twelve years and you still quiver when someone touches you. The rape joke is that he hasn’t stopped laughing. The rape joke is that you forgot how to.

Female authority is still associated with childhood, and the last time a lot of powerful guys saw a powerful woman they were eight, and they feel regressed to childhood by a powerful woman in a way that they don’t feel with a man.