Thirty years have come and gone,
But thirty years isn’t what I see
In a reflection in a mirror
Always staring into me
I see years gone by
Memories mixed and jumbled
I see a little girl talking to stuffed lions
A teenager on a field with a goal
A high schooler for the first time going back to public school
I taste the baked goods 14 year old me
became obsessed with making
I smell the soccer field in the disposable camera photos
I was insistent on taking
I see a girl praying,
Crying
Laughing
Growing
I see a girl who naively showed up to a party
Not knowing the new road on which she would soon be going
I see a girl at 23
Innocent and young
Waiting for someone to show up
Not knowing he wouldn’t come.
You were his friend,
So what could go wrong?
But a simple post broke my heart that night
And you kept making the drinks come.
Did you know I’d never been drunk before?
I didn’t know how it would feel,
But something about my unsteadiness
Just didn’t seem real.
The hours passed
And things began to get blurry,
I couldn’t walk without holding on to things,
Do you ever feel sorry?
I made it to the bathroom,
By holding onto a couch, a lamp, a wall,
I had to squint to find the faucet
I couldn’t look myself steadily in the eyes
I stumbled back out
And you had laid down,
I told you to move,
But you gestured for me to lay.
I said “no.”
Do you remember?
I said I’d find a bed,
I held onto things to guide me to
A place to rest my head.
The room was spinning, I couldn’t see,
I remember closing the door.
Is a closed door an invitation?
Clearly you couldn’t be sure.
I closed my eyes and began to fade,
But the next thing I knew...
You were laying next to me
Was this a game to you?
I told you to stop,
Do you remember?
I reminded you that you were his friend,
You told me he didn’t care,
As if that gave you permission.
I remember crying,
And you telling me to relax,
Did you even kiss me?
I can’t recall,
As if that would make it less painful at all.
The room was spinning, I couldn’t stand,
Do you ever think about the limp nature
Of my hands?
Do you see my tears falling,
As you told me to relax?
Do you ever feel sorry
For the sins of your past?
Did you know I was a virgin?
That I was saving myself for marriage,
At least that was my plan
But you probably couldn’t have cared less.
I was just another conquest,
Another victory without a choice
Was I the only one?
Were there more without a voice?
I drove home 3 hours later, still dizzy and unstable,
I tried to tell myself any lie that I was able.
I told myself I chose it,
That it was what I wanted,
It was the only way I could press forward
To try and prevent myself from being haunted.
I tried to talk to you,
Do you remember what I said?
I tried to get us to start being “friends.”
I thought if I convinced myself that this was of my choosing
Maybe if you cared about me,
It wouldn’t be my whole self I was losing.
You didn’t care, you fed me some line
“Not looking for a relationship, it’s just not the right time.”
You know a month later you began dating your now wife?
Do you think if she knew
That she may have thought twice?
A night of fun for you,
And years of heart break for me,
Of making stupid choices,
Of packing up and running away repeatedly.
I didn’t want to face it,
I didn’t want to become a #metoo,
But I have to,
You see,
Because I’m not just a daughter anymore,
now I have a daughter too.
Would you care,
if you knew?
I have to raise her
To protect herself from men like you.
I have to raise her to be aware
And to always move with caution,
To understand every single one of her options
I have to let her know
That if something should EVER happen,
It isn’t her fault for being a victim
It’s your fault I’m this fearful,
That my anxiety is so strong,
Do you care about your impact?
Do you realize it’s lasted this long?
Thirty years have gone by,
And one blurry night
To change them all,
One night has changed 7 years,
Decisions after decisions
Good and bad
It’s influenced them all.
But thirty years is enough to know
That I too have a voice,
That I am stronger than I realize
And that night was never my choice.
You took something from me,
Something that meant so very much,
And because of you I ran away,
But I’ve grown stronger
Each and every painful passing day.
I may not have done anything,
I may have let it go,
But all that really matters now,
Is that I hold onto the truth
And breathe out and let go.
