i

Who do you think you are?

Who/do you/think/you/are?

Whodoyouthinkyou     are?

 

 

ii.

My mother is dead. Her voice

knocks inside in my head.

I answer, of course

 

it is no body.

 

 

iii.

My friend  told me      Don’t speak of  it     don’t  

don’t speak  speak, speak   don’t     we must keep

each other’s secrets.

 

 

iv.

Right now there is an eight-year-old girl

who will not wash her hair.

 

 

v.

She is sitting on the third wood step

down to the basement; she is staring

 

 

vi.

into a bright light cradled

in a white socket high above her head. She will not        

                       

                                                                                                                       

vii.

remember this night for 20 years; her father’s hand

on her bedroom door.

 

                                               

 

 

viii.

This is not a metaphor.

I was a grown woman and I was hungry.

I won an award. The prize was dinner.  I ate

without looking up

from my plate. I ate everything

I wouldn’t dare name.

 

           

ix.

 

After he raped her, my student tells me,  he took pictures--a video--

of her vagina; he made the lips talk.

 

 

 

x

It isn’t the word      puttana

but the drawing out of each vowel;

this is what makes you a whore.

 

 

xi

it’s  too much       it’s not enough      just shut up

know what this is?  Now

 

lift your eyes off this page         

 

 

© Lois Roma-Deeley