They tell her, it’s not their place.  
Say, he’s always been good to me.  
Say, she should have left sooner.

They say a lot of things,  
but never the ones that matter.  

Her black eye is a private matter.  
Her broken ribs, just a lover’s spat.  
Her ******? A tragedy—  
but never a crime until her name  
is trending in the headlines.  

When she packed her bags,  
they called her selfish for breaking the family.  
When she stayed,  
they called her weak for not leaving.  

But where was she supposed to go?  
Shelters with no room?  
A courtroom where his lies outweigh her bruises?  
A graveyard where they’d whisper,  
She should have known better?  

They say, not all men.  
Say, he was under stress.  
Say, he’s a good dad,
as if a man who leaves his children hungry,  
their mother in pieces,  
is anything but a walking threat.  

And you—  
the man who doesn’t hit,  
but laughs at the ones who do.  
The one who turns away when your friend grabs her wrist too hard.  
The one who stays silent when your coworker brags,  
"I keep my woman in line."  

You are part of this.  

You are why she doesn’t call for help.  
Why she learns to stitch her own wounds in silence.  
Why she dies and they ask what she did to deserve it.  

The system says, report him.  
Then calls her bitter.  
Then hands him weekends with the children—  
the same children he left cowering behind locked doors.  

And when she’s gone, they’ll ask:  
Why didn’t she say something?

But all she ever did was scream  
into a void of indifferent men,  
silent women,  
and a world that let her be hunted.  

So hear this now:  

If you know, speak.  
If you see, stop him.  
If you call yourself an ally, act.  

Because the only men who fear consequences  
are the ones who know they deserve them.

Morticia and Gomez gazed
From their card on the altar—
Devotion eternal,
A love fierce enough
To blaze through darkness,
Tender enough
To cradle every wound.
A family photo stood nearby,
Encircled by a constellation
Of crystals:
Amethyst murmuring peace,
Rose quartz pulsing with love,
Black tourmaline bracing
For unseen battles.
Pink and white flames danced,
Their whispers rising like prayers:
Promises to draw us closer,
To fill our hearts
With everything we dare dream.

The classroom became our living room.
We learned together—alphabet to perseverance.
Public schools taught rules;
I taught love that bends to fit a child.