Privilege

A poem for men who don't understand what we mean when we say that they have it.

privilege is simple:

going for a pleasant stroll after dark,

not checking the back of your car as you get in, sleeping soundly,

speaking without interruption, and not remembering

dreams of rape, that follow you all day. that woke you up crying, and

privilege

is not seeing your stripped, humiliated body

plastered in celebration across every magazine rack, privilege

is going to the movies and not seeing yourself

terrorized, defamed, battered, butchered

seeing something else.

privilege is

riding your bicycle across town without being screamed at or

run off the road, not needing an abortion, taking off your shirt

on a hot day, in a crowd, not wishing you could type better

just in case - not shaving your legs, having a good job and

expecting to keep it, not feeling the boss's hand up your crotch,

dozing off on late-night buses, privilege

is being the hero in the TV show, not the dumb broad,

living where your genitals are totemized not denied,

knowing your doctor won't rape you.

privilege is being

smiled at all day by nice, helpful women, it is

the way you pass judgment on their appearance with magisterial authority,

the way you face a judge of your own sex in court and

are overrepresented in Congress and are not assaulted by the police

or used as a dart board by your friendly mechanic, privilege

is seeing your bearded face echo through the history texts

not only of your high school days but all of your life, not being

relegated to a paragraph

every other chapter, the way you occupy

entire poetry books and more than your share of the couch unchallenged,

it is your mouthing smug, atrocious insults at women

who blink and change the subject - politely - privilege

is how seldom the rapist's name appears in the papers

and the way you smirk over your Playboy

it's simple really. privilege

means someone else's pain, your wealth

is my terror, your uniform

is a women raped to death her or in Cambodia or wherever

wherever your obscene privilege

writes your name in my blood, it's that simple,

you've always had it, that's why it doesn't

seem to make you sick at stomach,

you have it, we pay for it

now do you understand?