It's Time To Scream

I should have said it.

Loud. Angry. Wrong.

I should have said it

And suffered the fallout.

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This is wrong.

.

I should have said it instead of hoping on a ballot measure

Or believing that filling in a bubble was enough to stop

The rampaging hate ripping red lines through a country

Of golden fields worked by tired hands that like to dream.

.

This is wrong.

.

I should have said it, should have screamed until my throat bled

Because that is what I was taught to do at five years old

When soft old women, rattled by abuse, told me that someone,

Inevitably, would come to hurt me, kill me, steal me away.

.

This is wrong.

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I should have said that they were right, that I am scarred and broken.

That men threatened my life, that I am a statistic of a statistic,

That I can feel the imprints of unwanted touch like ghosts on my skin.

And no amount of smiling more will cover up that agony.

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This is wrong.

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I should have said I've never met a woman who wasn't wounded.

I should have opened my mouth and let my own stories fall like acid

Without worrying about the pain it would cause the perpetrators.

Shame is a valuable tool and I should have said something sooner.

.

This is wrong.

.

I should have said that in my blood, the rainbow gathers, that I love all,

And that it is no good excuse for you spit at me or slit my throat.

I exist away from violence and shelter the smallest bug in my palm

But you are interested in bleeding the world and me along with it.

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This is wrong.

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I am other.

For my love, I am condemned.

For my gender, I am chained.

For my morality, I am slapped.

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This is wrong.

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I should have said that those like me do not deserve death for their love.

Go look in the oil slick sheen covering the puddles of fouled water,

Look in your reflection if you're interested in the death of love.

I promise it gathers there like a white nationalist rally, loud and ugly.

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This is wrong.

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I am a rebel lover, a boat-rocker, a cataclysm of kindness, a fire of freedom.

And I should have said that, at the start, that I would fight for my freedom.

Freedom to love. Freedom to speak. Freedom to live as I am without terror.

I will fight for the freedom from the dominance of cruelty and I will speak.

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This is wrong.

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