Don't look past these eyes

Sitting, shivering, awakened, you ask what was the dream...


Please don't look past these eyes


Please don't make me feel


I'm scared to let go


Scared to show


Scared to know that pain is still real





You know, as the minutes have moved on. As the hours have turned into days. As the days have turned into months. As the months have become years, I still feel it. Not so often now. Hardly ever really, but it is there. It seems to always be there. Right below the surface. Never showing until I am still enough, quite enough to feel it stir. Then it rises.


Love me. Just Love me.





My God, after all these years the pain of rape still rises to the surface in quite moments. The dreams still haunt me. The blank moments of my youth I still cannot recall. The torment of being told how ugly you are and your body is the only worth. I still cannot look in the mirror without torture and disgust.





There are days I feel so alive. So valued. So in control of my life. Then my eyes close and my memories remind me I am broken. I awake. Sit. Stare. Try and remember I have come so far. I have lived through it. I am still here. Still strong. My heart still beats with passion. I convince myself again I am not scared. It has had no effect on me. I am not damaged. No one knows, so I can still hide. It was so long ago.



I am reminded though. Every time I cannot look at my own reflection. Every time I am told I am pretty and I shutter. I am reminded.





The dreams remember being pushed face first into the pillow, raping in an area where he would leave the hymen intact. Even now, I still cannot say it.





The dreams remember watching my brothers feet under the bed as he stood so far away not knowing what was happening. He stood in the partially opened doorway playing 'Judy'. He was told to watch for enemies, which were parents, while behind the cover of the high bed, the older boy slipped his tongue between my thighs. That is all my dreams show, just the distance of his feet and the tears trickling down my face... quietly, so my brother wouldn't be harmed.





The dreams recall the classmate who drove friends and I home from school;who one day took me home alone, yet behind an empty white church laid blood trailing down legs. Every cry of 'no', every desperate shove away from his hips were answered with another brutal thrust. After being dropped home as if nothing happened, the evidence was quickly cleaned, clothes buried beneath the kitchen garbage and the memory captured as a photo shoot happened that evening. Dad's and family cannot be disappointed.





The dreams vividly tell of limbs being frozen. The terror of a mind knowing what is getting ready to happen as the pants are pulled away. The drugs that were slipped in your drink give him access to it all without any retaliation. The horror in flashes as you slip in and out of consciousness and back into a black abyss.





The dreams reminisce of marriage, being scolded and verbally broken every time I let go and enjoyed making love. Climaxes brought what seemed like hours of his mouth moving with noise flying at me.





I have come far. I have lived through it and to look at me you would never know. Everything is open yet those are the secrets I hide. I have learned to sleep nude without the fear of what would happen when I drifted to sleep. I have learned to speak up for myself and to defend if necessary.


If you knew would you still love me? If you knew would you still accept me? I have never been willing to take that chance. You would probably think I am broken. I am used. Would you still want me? Why, when you could have something new? Something untainted.



So I will hide it. I will keep it where only my dreams recall the truth. That is my past. I am not her any longer. I am strong. I am beautiful. I am confident. I love and can be loved. The past does not define who I am, it only has helped to make me. I want you to know who I am today.



So, please don't look past these eyes
Please don't make me feel
I'm scared to let go
Scared to show
Scared to know that pain is still real.