I can’t remember it all clearly,
but I was being beaten by a man much bigger than me. Whipped.
Cleanly. Deliberately. Very surgically. Not with passion, but with great
skill. Not with a belt, but with a
switch from a tree. A willow tree
I think. It made cuts like a knife
across my skin. My skin was soft
and lily-white like a young girl’s.
Like a freshly fluffed pillow.
I did not cry, and I did not
scream. I was in terrible pain,
but I was not upset, as if I were used to it. I was conscious of the violence of the moment. I was conscious of the trauma, but not
affected by it at the time, except to say that I was sad. And I was lonely inside.
Like an orphan,
Like an orphan,
in an empty room.
