to make the implicit explicit; a poet said, make the implicit
explicit; a political theorist said, make the implicit explicit; the
blood o f women is implicit in the weaponry; I will take the
blood o f women implicit in the weaponry and I will make it
explicit; and from this I enunciate another political principle,
which is, The blood o f women is implicit, make it explicit. A
woman I didn’t know with the face o f an angel approached
me. She leaned over. She touched me softly on the shoulder.
She whispered. She had serious and kind eyes. She had a soft
and kind voice. Andrea, she said, it is very important for
women to kill men. I contemplated this, shuddering; I
meditated on it; I breathed in deeply; I drew pictures, stories o f
life with men, with pencils, with crayons; I dreamed; I
understood yes; yes, it is. I enunciated a political principle,
which went as follows: It is very important for women to kill
men. His death, o f course, is unbearable. His death is
intolerable, unspeakable, unfair, insufferable; I agree; I learned
it since the day I was born; terrible; his death is terrible; are you
crazy; are you stupid; are you cruel? He can’t be killed; for
what he did to you? It’s absurd; it’s silly; unjustified; uncivilized; crazed; another madwoman, where’s the attic? He didn’t mean it; or he didn’t do it, not really, or not fully, or not
knowing, or not intending; he didn’t understand; or he
couldn’t help it; or he w on ’t again; certainly he will try not to;
unless; well; he just can’t help it; be patient; he needs help;
sym pathy; over time. Yes, her ass is grass but you can’t expect
miracles, it takes time, she wasn’t perfect either you know; he
needs time, education, help, support; yeah, she’s dead meat;
but you can’t expect someone to change right away, overnight, besides she wasn’t perfect, was she, he needs time, help,
support, education; well, yeah, he was out o f control; listen,
she’s lucky it wasn’t worse, I’m not covering it up or saying
what he did was right, but she’s not perfect, believe me, and he
had a terrible mother; yeah, I know, you had to scrape her o ff
the ground; but you know, she w asn’t perfect either, he’s got a
problem; he’s human, he’s got a problem. Oh, darling, no; he
didn’t have a problem before; now he’s got a problem. I am on
this earth to see that now he has a problem. It is very important
for wom en to kill men; he’s got a problem now. I was in the
courtroom. The walls were brown. The judge wore a long
black dress. G o d ’s name was written on the wall over his head.
There were police everywhere. The rapist smiled; at the
woman. He had kidnapped her. He had held her for nearly
tw o days, or was it four, or were there five o f them, each being
tried separately? He had fucked her over and over, brutally.
He had sliced her with a knife. He had sodomized her. He had
burned her. She shaked; she shivered; she screamed; she cried.
He walked; the ju ry found her guilty. I was in the court. The
walls were gray. He beat the wom an near to death; they were
