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 Sep 2013 Tara India
Sylvia Plath
"I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

The stars go waltzing out in blue and red,
And arbitrary blackness gallops in:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I dreamed that you bewitched me into bed
And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

God topples from the sky, hell's fires fade:
Exit seraphim and Satan's men:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.

I fancied you'd return the way you said,
But I grow old and I forget your name.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

I should have loved a thunderbird instead;
At least when spring comes they roar back again.
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)"
 Sep 2013 Tara India
Ted Hughes
Freezing dusk is closing
    Like a slow trap of steel
On trees and roads and hills and all
    That can no longer feel.
        But the carp is in its depth
          Like a planet in its heaven.
        And the badger in its bedding
          Like a loaf in the oven.
        And the butterfly in its mummy
          Like a viol in its case.
        And the owl in its feathers
          Like a doll in its lace.

Freezing dusk has tightened
    Like a nut ******* tight
On the starry aeroplane
    Of the soaring night.
        But the trout is in its hole
          Like a chuckle in a sleeper.
        The hare strays down the highway
          Like a root going deeper.
        The snail is dry in the outhouse
          Like a seed in a sunflower.
        The owl is pale on the gatepost
          Like a clock on its tower.

Moonlight freezes the shaggy world
    Like a mammoth of ice -
The past and the future
    Are the jaws of a steel vice.
        But the cod is in the tide-rip
          Like a key in a purse.
        The deer are on the bare-blown hill
          Like smiles on a nurse.
        The flies are behind the plaster
          Like the lost score of a jig.
        Sparrows are in the ivy-clump
          Like money in a pig.

Such a frost
    The flimsy moon
        Has lost her wits.

          A star falls.

The sweating farmers
    Turn in their sleep
        Like oxen on spits.
 Sep 2013 Tara India
Tori Hart
"She should have known better."
"She had it coming for her."
"It's just a joke."
"And you're just sensitive."

You're ignorance glazes over your words
Like paint.
Thick, glossy, and shiny
Words covered with a gentle haze
Of misunderstanding.

Hearing those words
Of un-acknowledged shaming
And saddening victim blaming
Stabs straight through my numbed Soul.

But you know what?
I'm glad you are blinded by your
Ignorance ever so blissful.
I am glad you cannot see
How misguided your word can be.
Because that means
That you have not experienced
The Horror
Of being sexually harassed.

Because if you had the opportunity
To feel that kind of
Helplessness.
Terror.
Agony.
Violation.
Degration.

Then you would have never said
She could have prevented it.

And I thank God up in Heaven
That you have never experienced
That kind of pain.
This poem was inspired by a conversation with one of my closest friends. We're both very passionate about the hurt and triggering effects of victim-blaming, both against women and men.
I love you, Sam.

— The End —