Photo by StockSnap via Pixabay

When Hillary Is Us

Ré Harris
Aug 25, 2017 · 2 min read

I was strong
as my feet landed on the serrated edge,
on the tightrope blade
where his armored steps
kept me a moment longer
than my pumps could protect,

his very breath a living, postless fence
no mesh, no slats, no wire,
a formless barrier hung in air
yet harder to scale than metal structures with
“Keep Out” signs and barbed wire
that I could climb easier over
to make my escape.

His eye was a reminder
to forget myself and heel
or learn to run wounded.

But I was strong,
wounded and standing firm,
yet even so,
unable to ignore the second guesses
that weave and whisper from birth.

I was strong in the past,
and that trumps my moment’s hesitation
as the zeros and ones of
The Feminine Right Thing
computed my list of possible reactions
while I studied and planned and did my work,
dancing backward all the while.
In the expected high heels.
Or something of the sort.

I chose to ignore his looming presence.
Many would’ve labeled a confrontation
Emotional or Shrill,
no matter my tone of voice or the moves I made.
Being female will always make me that,
or cold,
in so many eyes.

My dilemma,
engineered by festering time:
how would the tangle of whispers affect my work
if I turned the moment
one way or the other?

Mine wasn’t the perfect strong response,
the one clear in their mind’s eye now,
the one they would choose
if they could go back and be me.
They believe they’ve always chosen well
between impossible choices.
Each of their whispers is one I’ve heard
ten thousand times or more,
in the tangle.

Written after hearing one clueless person after another respond like a self-important asshole to the 8/23/17 excerpt from Hillary Clinton’s book about the campaign, where she talks about Trump looming behind her during one of the debates like a stalker.

Resistance Poetry

Verse as Commentary

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