They held me down,

I chose to go,

Blades are cheap,

Again and again they cut,

And I scream and I scream.

I don’t know how she did it,

Alert until she faints.

It’s so remote, no turning back,

We’re off to see your grandmother,

They lied.

I shouldn’t have read this,

Shouldn’t have thought …

And they act like they’re so happy.

You’ll be beautiful, they say.

A gory trip through YouTube, I can’t stop.

No-one talks about it, we all know.

It’s the not knowing that’s driven me here,

Or is it the knowing,

Knowing that my mother died?

Sometimes we don’t come back.

‘Why didn’t you just say no?’ he asks.

Like I knew, like I had any idea.

And if I’d known, and if I know,

And if I could see, would I still?

And will my girl? What daughter?

It’s easy for you, I spat, you don’t have to.

‘But if my wife, my sister, my daughter …’ He says.

What right have you, I say,

To try to walk in my shoes?

My breasts are still untried,

Should I wait?

It’s too late now, you hold me down.

I choose the knife. 

I don’t know how she did.

What choice?

Seven men,

And when the question rose,

Qui me tiendra ce sein?

She said, I will,

She chose.

 

And like today, my choice laid plain,

When I look back,

Would I make it again?

 

I don’t know how you did it

And I walk towards the knife,

Steel glitters.

Strange perverted choice.

Cut me! I call.

Slice me left and right.

(And all the world watches Angelina Jolie, seeming unscathed.)

And the man, it’s always a man,

Takes up the knife.

Strange courage, cut that which might be good.

His risk, and mine,

Partners in violation.

What good could they have done?

And what harm?

Death and life in his plastic hand.

 

I don’t know how you do it.

Nor do I,

Each morning as I watch my fingers crawl,

A little higher up the wall.

Did I make the right choice?

You chose.

They never knew,

What grew inside you.

Who can tell?

I’ll never know if I share my sister’s fate.

(it’s ninety-ten)

And still I chose.

What choice had you?