Testimony

by Kaitlin LaMoine Martin


September 27th  2018

a blade is held to my skin or

i hold a blade to my skin or

my skin hugs a blade

a love tells me again to get off the internet

so i pick up an anthology about rape

and my chest fills with bees

i suppose they swarm

my aunt describes how the hive

forms a sphere in winter

the queen at the center

as the rest rotate in and out

to keep from freezing

bees understand survival

except they’re all dying or

we’re killing them or

we’re allowing them to be killed

i’m still learning about verbs

i’ve been the object of too many sentences

maybe the blade is a metaphor

this time or maybe it’s a rubber

band snapping against my wrist

i have to admit i like the storm sometimes

sometimes i don’t

i noosed the flowers so they’d stay

with me longer

i’m running out of ways

to song myself

i run or i ran

it’s the temporary exits i crave

we put a rock in the back door at work

to keep it from locking

when we need sunshine

all over our faces

i’ve counted the cubicle walls

in that place 83 in case

you were wondering

i added them up after the active shooter

training we had or

awareness exercise

the cop called it i guess

after he jumped in the room and

pretended to shoot us

we laughed because

dead isn’t funny

but dying apparently is

it’s tense

this rumor of language

each shot across the bow

a girl bakes the cookies

a boy rapes the girl

the cookies were baked

the girl was raped

does being subject sting less or

synonyms for object: thing

article item device gadget entity

target recipient victim

a thing dragged

the blade begs and becomes