Ice And Fire

have to sleep with him, surely that is not what he meant.

*

I know what he wanted, he wanted me to ask to see the scars, to

run my fingers over them, to love him because of them, to stay

there, touching the scars, while he bit and clawed and screwed. I

have seen such scars. Of course, I knew what he wanted: old

habits: familiarity, the smell, the language of the body: you run

your hands over scars like that and you stay the night.

*

I get home. The windows are open. The wind blows through. I

am so cold.

*

I don’t want him. I need him, oh desperately, but I don’t want

him. I have his secret, sorrow added to sorrow, pain added to

pain, rape added to rape. I am faithful to the raped, it is my

only fidelity. I have his secret. It was a blood oath but not on

my blood, my real blood, so it is not enough, I know that, he

is a man, he needs my real blood, my blood is the blood beyond

symbol, uterine blood, vaginal blood, seasonal blood, stench

blood, strong blood; it is not over because it has not been my

blood, him cutting, me bleeding, the way a man and woman

do it. Others say: oh, he is gay, don’t worry, he doesn’t want

that. Others say: oh, don’t be silly, he can’t want that. Oh, he

can’t want that. I want to buy it. He can’t want that. The

raped don’t do that to the raped, I want to believe.

*

Others say: oh, don’t be silly, he can’t want that. I am dense,

troubled but dense. Before I knew what he wanted and how he

wanted it, but now I am blinded, because the raped don’t do

that to the raped. I decide: he can’t want that. I don’t believe it

really, but others say he can’t want that, so I don’t really know

what he wants, not that, I say. I pick a posture: he has told me

a secret: we are colleagues with a special understanding: his

secret: I will be patient and loyal because of his secret: because

I hurt in his behalf. I am always astonished by the cruelty of

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rape. I am awed by the enduring of it. I am awed by those who

carry the secret: those bodies carrying it, burned in; those minds

collapsing under the weight of vivid recollection that doesn’t

pale with time. I am awed by the intensity of the never-

assuaged anguish. I am confused. I don’t know what he wants

from me. He can’t want that. In private, I am troubled. In public

I am dense; we are colleagues with a special understanding.

*

I feel dread, confusion, panic: he can’t want that. That is so

simple and this whole routine is so complex. I need him but I