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Beautiful Words

Pocket-sized Feminism (Blythe Baird)

12/4/2016

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There are days I want people to like me more than I want to change the world. ​
"POCKET-SIZED FEMINISM

The only other girl at the party is ranting about feminism.
The audience: 
a sea of rape jokes and snapbacks and styrofoam cups and me.
They gawk 
at her mouth like it is a drain clogged with too many opinions.
I shoot her an empathetic glance and say nothing.
This house is for 
wallpaper women.
What good 
is wallpaper that speaks? 

I want to stand up, but if I do, 
whose coffee table silence will these boys rest their feet on? 
I want to stand up, but if I do, what if someone takes my spot? 
I want to stand up, but if I do, what if everyone notices I’ve been 
sitting this whole time?
I am guilty 
of keeping my feminism in my pocket until it is convenient not to, like at poetry 
slams or my women’s studies class. 

There are days I want people to like me 
more than I want to change the world. 
There are days I forget we had to invent nail polish to change color in drugged
drinks and apps to virtually walk us home at night and mace disguised as lipstick. 
Once, I told a boy I was powerful and he told me to mind my own business.
Once, a boy accused me of practicing misandry. 

You think you can take over the world?
 
And I said 
No, I just want to see it. 
I just need 
to know it is there for someone. 
Once, my dad informed me sexism is dead and reminded me to always carry pepper spray in the same breath. 
We accept this state of constant fear as just another part of being a girl. 
We text each other when we get home safe
and it does not occur to us that our 
guy friends do not have to do the same.
You could saw a woman in half and it would be called a magic trick. 
That’s why you invited us here, isn’t it?
Because there is no show 
without a beautiful assistant? 
We are surrounded by boys who hang up our naked posters and fantasize
about choking us and watch movies we get murdered in.

We are the daughters 
of men who warned us about the news 
and the missing girls on the milk carton 
and the sharp edge of the world. 
They begged us to be careful. To be safe.
Then told our brothers to go out and play."
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