WiTh This poWer no one can Take (poeTry 2nd place) - Bayan Atari

The next day, I woke up handcuffed to a hospital bed. A doctor entered the room and asked how I was feeling. I told him that I was fine.

He looked at me and said, “Well, I sure hope so! I wish would have been able to tell you this under better circumstances, but it seems that you’re expecting.”

I looked at him in disbelief. He also said that I had been pregnant for a little over 13 weeks so I would not have to worry about suffering another miscarriage. I leaned back and released a long sigh. All I could do was smile. I wasn’t happy that I was pregnant, but I was happy my husband would never get the pleasure of meeting our unborn child.

NONFICTION FIRST PLACE

Redefinition

by Ashley McCoy

Rape: [reyp] 1. The unlawful compelling of a person through physical force or duress to have sexual intercourse. 2. Any act of sexual intercourse that is forced upon a person.

It’s not a very pleasant word. It tends to have a negative effect on whoever hears it. Reads it. There is so much power in that tiny word. You go, “Oh.” That’s right; rape exists. It exists and its existence makes you uncomfortable. That little fourletter word. Yes, that one. The mere idea is enough to make one shudder. There is so much power in that word.

Don’t get me wrong. It should make you shudder. Hell, it should make everyone angry. And I’m not talking the “cat knocked over a glass of water and it broke” angry. No no no. Blood-boiling. Your blood should seethe at the mere thought, the mere inkling that something like rape exists. Maybe then no one would struggle through the shit-storm of regaining power that comes after it.

I was raped. No, it wasn’t violent. Physically. The kind of violence that shows like Law and Order: SVU like to attach to rape was thankfully absent from my experience. Neither of us was drunk. Neither of us was on drugs. He didn’t beat me into submission. We didn’t hit each other (that night). And here’s the kicker: he was my boyfriend.

We were high school sweet-hearts—met at 15, dated for three turbulent years. We both were “troubled teenagers.” I wore baggy black clothes and discovered the miraculously fitting gift of not being able to tan. I never took care of myself: greasy hair, untrimmed eyebrows, junk food, B.O.—all there. He was socially withdrawn, ADD, awkward, and had a terrible and sometimes violent home life. Bam! Angsty teen romance. Before it got not funny. Before he started hitting me. Before I started hitting him right the hell back. Before he raped me while I cried softly to the sky I couldn’t see.

What society and popular culture (see above: Law and Order) tend to forget is that for a lot of people, rape isn’t violent in the classical sense of the word. It most likely isn’t a stranger who does the raping. That leaves victims to wonder. Questions bubble forth. Was it rape? He’s my boyfriend, right? I didn’t want it, but… Stop. The fact that you have to ask yourself is an indication. I didn’t ask that question until much to late. The misconceptions that society places on rape kept me going. I hate it. I hate it because I’m almost certain that it keeps people from coming forward, from reaching out to others who might help them process their inner turmoil. That’s what everyone gets wrong: everyone seems to think that rape is something that’s physical. That’s where the danger is—your body. If only it were that simple.

It’s what it does to your mind. What it does to you. Your “self.” It changes you. Twists you. Perverts you into something you’re not, that you weren’t. You begin to question yourself. There’s always that feeling, a feeling like you’re forgetting something but not really forgetting. It sits on your chest and hides in the shadows in the corners of your vision. Whoever you were before, you are no longer. It wasn’t your choice. It took you and hammered you out into a new shape so fast that you don’t have time to gather your grip. Chances are you start to act, talk, in ways that you never did before. I started drinking. Doing every drug I could get my hands on. Having sex with anyone and everyone, but only hanging around for one night. Skipped classes. Skipped work. Cried myself to sleep without knowing why. Ignored everything.

It took me a long while to get a handle on what happened. I was doing my best not to think about it. After a push (Chlamydia), I decided to pull myself together. I tried to. I started going to therapy, where I discovered I get to carry around PTSD as a result for the rest of my life. I had to struggle hard to gain some semblance of control over who I was. That’s what rape does—it takes away from you.

Society likes to think that as long as the rape wasn’t “violent,” the person is fine. Physical violence isn’t the only violence. Rape is emotionally violent. It makes you question the base of your very soul. It gets in your head. Stays there. I have flashbacks of the emotions I had when it happened. It made it hard to keep a boyfriend. It ruined what was a good

relationship. I couldn’t argue with someone I was involved with without panicking and cowering in a corner, shutting down and crying hysterically. It has all the power over you. Over yourself. Over your feelings.

That’s what it comes down to. When a person is raped, they lose power over themselves. That is what sinks in and sticks. It’s terrifying. That’s what I struggled with. I had to gain back my sense of power over myself, a thing that most people never have to lose.

It comes back. You make it come back. You fight. You fucking fight with every ounce of spirit left in your body to come back out on top. You don’t ever, ever give up. You. Are. You. You always have been and you always will beautifully be you. Nothing and no one can take that away from you. Oh, they can try. But you can’t let them. You take that awful, disgusting little word and you hammer it. You shape it into what you want it to be. Rape can’t own you. That’s not who you are. Rape can’t tell you who to be. Only you are allowed to redefine yourself.

You get to own “rape.” You get to take it, overcome it, and make it your bitch.