they told me not to sip too much from the solo cups
if I didn’t want to get raped tonight.
the feminist issue here is not keeping up
but keeping low, keeping unnoticed,
staying as safe as that moldy orange in the Safeway,
never gonna get plucked up and raped that way.
they told me not to indulge my senses and enhance my intoxication
levels at risk of decreasing my chances of
survival against a rapist
attacking me.
they told me I feel like I need to keep up with the guys with my drinks,
match my stack of cups to theirs, and I just think
that’s bullshit, I just want to drink my shitty beer,
but they said that’s how I’ll get raped.
well maybe I binge on a lot of bad habits.
I pile them up on the CVS counter like a checklist of things not to do,
smoke, spend too much money and time on ebay bidding on
vintage rings and things I’ll never need, eat a row of oreos out of
my roomate’s care package, and drink too much at the occasional
party where I fraternize with the males from planet greek,
but does that make me guilty for getting raped?
today I woke up feeling like a damaged cause,
like a present that fell out of the back door of a UPS truck going
75 miles per hour on the highway in East Tennessee
and I never got to my destination.
should I have buckled my seat belt tighter?
society makes me feel crazy for thinking I can try to prevent
a violent act of maddening hate against a woman’s body,
or maybe a man’s, let’s not discriminate,
brought on by alcohol, late night musing, and punch bowl brewing.
maybe they should tell the rapists to keep their pants zipped
and their dicks to themselves unless they are requested.
keep your hands in your pastel short pockets and
let me go on with my business of being a proud, righteous woman.