Today I received an email, a response from The Invisibles, the anonymous authors of the letter that first circulated at AWP this past April. You can read more about that here. I know I’m not the only one who received this email, but I don’t know the extended list of recipients, and these are such necessary words I want them to be accessible to everyone and so will post the body of the email here. I cried when I was finished reading, because why is this so hard? It is so hard, to go on living and writing in this wasted landscape. I am perpetually exhausted. And I am so thankful for those who understand this and listen and care. Whoever you are/ wherever you are: thank you so much. You have given me strength. I support you. 

“***TRIGGER WARNING for gendered violence, assault***

To our friends, allies, (fr)enemies and otherwise:

Our silence doesn’t represent absence. We’ve been silent not because we don’t exist, but because the thorough victim-blaming and protection of abusers in light of the original statement has been so sickening and triggering for us we had to retreat in order to recuperate, in order to survive. They might be asking, why now? Why after so long, especially when it seems a particular abuser has been revealed for who he really is? It would seem like due to recent events that this response has no purpose but now it is more crucial than ever to respond. This is not just about one abuser. This is about a culture of silencing. About those who are already nearly invisible in this “community”: people of color, queers, genderqueers, trans folks; anyone who falls outside the binary and gets left behind. The connection between those who silence, ignore, and question survivors and those who do whatever they can to protect their own and the legacies of whiteness is not arbitrary. We are watching.  

People demand proof. They emphasize their own innocuous interactions with the accused as a sign of his innocence. They denigrate the character of those who speak out against sexual violence. They keep silent so as to remain on some neutral ground that does not exist. They ask the wrong questions, pointedly directing their dubiousness towards anyone but the accused.

When we realized that those who had stood with the survivors of the abuse and had made declarations of solidarity on social media, those who had run articles and think-pieces in light of the fractures within this poetry community, were receiving threats of legal action if they didn’t acquiesce to demands of censorship, we knew silence was not an option. We knew these were not “gentle letters.”

A survivor of one of the named abusers received graphic and specific death threats on an article, which included an image of our original statement. This is unacceptable. It is also unacceptable to chastise the “violent” rhetoric of certain outspoken survivors and turn a blind eye to violent, victim-shaming articles and blog posts written in defense of abusers, rife with expletives while referring to survivors and to The Invisibles as “indie terrorists.”

We came forward as an anonymous body, and people attacked our credibility, questioned our identities, our tactics, and our motives in lieu of engaging with the substance of our statement. To those who still question the legitimacy of our anonymity, the constant violence waged against us has completely proven its necessity. In a world where survivors have no voice, are routinely gas-lit and shamed, our so-called violent rhetoric clears a space for us to assert our presence. We are here. We exist. We matter.  

If we came forward as ourselves, non-anonymously, people would viciously redouble their criticism, claiming we were the ones attacking an innocent party, us the villains and the person in question the true victim. This is not an exaggeration. We’ve left names out of this statement to legally protect the victims and survivors of misogynistic violence and avoid the lawsuit implicitly threatened by the cease & desist that other outspoken people have received. Don’t think this exemption will last forever, though. The names were a reminder to not forget the acts of violence that began to emerge and be socially recognized within the past year. They were also a warning to our peers.

The reaction to our first missive proves it: if you speak up against sexual violence in this community, you will be actively silenced by those who hold power. If you dare to say or even repeat the names of those accused, you will be served with legal intimidation in the form of a cease and desist. These are the affordances of a man with power: to wipe the slate clean, to scare into silence those who have nothing to do with The Invisibles but have spoken out against sexual violence. If you’re a “feminist” why would you uphold the privilege of men in power? How long will women have to bow down in hopes of recognition? Who asked men to do “feminist” work? Why does the “community” value it? Despite all of these months the response is still the same. Nothing has changed except an open understanding that this is only the tip of the iceberg. How this is so much more than rape culture. How deep the disbelief, the defense, the shaming goes. We understand that this is war.

Scores of people wield their concern for the accused and titillate over how terrible it all is. Hardly anyone has said: how terrible it is that the only recourse to a modicum of relief is to say a single name from the safety of anonymity. Few have emphasized how terrible it is to be relentlessly attacked and doubted when one comes out with allegations of wrongdoing, however anonymous, however imprecise. Why does the accused get the benefit of the doubt while the burden of proof falls unduly on survivors’ shoulders? Why are people so quick to jump to someone’s defense when it is merely suggested that they have abused their power and harmed others? It is all too clear where their priorities are.

For those confused about the “actual accusations” being levied, you must understand this desire for “clarity” is not a desire for truth or knowledge; it is a desire for information so they can play detective. The punitive and juridical logic of the courts rises to the tops of everyone’s consciousness in times of moral panic when social capital is at stake. We repeat ourselves: this is not about any single person, nor about enforcing a carceral feminism. This is about a culture that underwrites and sustains emotional and physical patriarchal violence. Even for those who believe in the state’s hegemony over “truth,” you are still at a loss. Sexual assault is one of the most under-reported crimes, with 68% still being left unreported. Only about 2% of all rape and related sex charges are false. For those in doubt, the court is not a viable site of resistance as it is more likely to protect those in power rather than those who are most vulnerable.  

It’s time to take the lurid spotlight off of abusers. We need to refocus ourselves on the needs of survivors and work on creating safer spaces that don’t reinforce our broken power structures. And that starts with listening to us when we speak out—even anonymously—and believing us. The literary community and self-proclaimed feminists within it need to stop blaming, censoring, and shaming survivors or being too afraid to give support. This “community” is fractured. This abuse and the fear tactics need to be exposed so that we can collectively recognize this pain and work towards building a possible future we would want to live in. Just because survivors choose anonymity as their platform does not mean they are terrorists or liars or people with an “agenda” to take down or destroy publishers or presses.

While you squabble over our tone and our tactics, survivors spend their nights reliving trauma and seeking refuge in a world where precious little exists. This may not be how you personally envisioned misogynistic violence falling, but this is only one of many tactics we have chosen to proceed with. Deal with it. You feel uncomfortable with our methods; we refuse to apologize for your discomfort in the face of ongoing misogyny, violence, and silencing. All survivors, we believe you unequivocally and support and stand with you. We are The Invisibles, and we will not be intimidated into silence.”

I want to write a poem and I want to call it No

I want to scream / virally

I want to write a poem because I refuse

I refuse to let you ruin poetry / the thing that seems to be saving me

*

I really do want to write a poem and I really do want to call it No. I want to say No over and over in every way that I can. I want every atom of every cell in my body to take the same shape as my mouth and join me in saying No. I want to be as strong as the brick wall I am always banging my head against. I want to be stronger than the brick wall. And then I think: I am stronger. I am.

I want to write a poem but ultimately I care more about people than poetry and can’t afford to spend time thinking about rhythm and line breaks when victims of gender-based violence are being stepped on (again), hurt (again), pushed down (again), intimidated into silence (again again again).

I don’t know what to say, exactly, but I am going to keep on saying No.

I am going to say Bruce Covey’s name because people are afraid to say Bruce Covey’s name, and I don’t blame them – he has used legal threats and emotional manipulation to isolate people and scare them into silence. His scare tactics are working, and it pains me to witness the pain of others as they are forced to choose silence as a means of self-protection. People worried about their families, their finances, their homes. Punished for saying: I hear you. I am listening. I care.

I received one of those letters, and I said No:

I said No because the future I want to live in is a future where No, not fear, is the norm. Where No is heard loud and clear. Where my No is respected. Where my No is taken seriously. The Future: When I say No: You Listen. Stop. Do not fuck with me / I do not consent.

I do not consent to being silent as a poetry press attempts to reassert its power as if doing so is a harmless act. I do not consent to being silent as Bruce Covey continues to receive support as a publisher and poet, this man who calls himself an intersectional feminist yet tokenizes women of color and victims of sexual abuse, using them as pawns to bolster his feminist image. This man who sends baseless legal threats to women and non-binary people simply because they have demonstrated strong victim advocacy in the past. Why are we a threat to you? This man who says he received a “veiled threat” concerning the safety of his children, as if anyone who actually feels threatened would say they received a “veiled threat.”

Side note: wtf is a “veiled threat”? I have only received actual threats concerning the safety of my child:

This is what I received the very first time I spoke publicly about my personal experiences of abuse. I was very, very scared.

I don’t want to be scared anymore. I do not consent. I do not consent to a lifetime of fear. I do not consent to being silent while white men in literature continue to abuse their positions of power, while Bruce Covey insulates himself with a flock of women – and the women, I don’t even know what to say to you. Do I feel sorrow for you? Am I scared of you? Am I deeply pained? Am I angry as fuck? Yes, and yes, and yes, and yes. Why do you say yes? Do you not see that choosing to say yes to him is a choice to say no to so many others? Where did you find the nerve to label yourselves as feminists and victim-advocates? Because that is some fucking nerve. Enough is enough. You are not a safe space.  

I don’t want to be scared and I am not scared. What’s going to happen? Will Bruce Covey threaten me with more legal action for telling the Internet that Bruce Covey threatened me with legal action? What if I tell you he made me feel uncomfortable before I knew anyone else had been harmed by him? That I didn’t know what to say, that I brushed it off as no big deal, because that’s what we learn to do, conditioned to accept oppressive behavior, conditioned to give, conditioned to not say: No.

*

I want to write a poem and I want to break what they think they know about us. I want to burn the scripts they etch into our skin with their smiling teeth, their kindness, their uncivil civility.

I want to write a poem but if I start the poem it means I will have to end the poem and I don’t want to stop saying No.

I want to write a poem but first I had to tell You, Dear Ones, Invisible and Near: Yes. I hear you. And Yes. And Love. And Yes. 

It’s the day before Valentine’s Day and for the fourth day in a row this week I’ve woken up with chest pains. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I still sleep in the bed where he raped me, in the apartment where so much of the abuse happened. I only got the apartment when I did because he wanted to visit me so badly. It was good for me to move out of my parents’ house (my father’s continued emotional and psychological abuse was making me ill), but traumatic memories have a way of lingering. They are in every shadow. I hope to have the means to move away soon. 

But it’s not just my personal trauma that gives me chest pains – it’s also the trauma that’s happening in the world, every day, all day, the sexism, the racism, the transphobia, the classism, the ableism, the empathy-deficit that is so strong I can’t help but think it will destroy the planet long before any bursting sun or meteor will. 

And today is the opening day of the movie Fifty Shades of Grey. I haven’t read the book and don’t plan to. I don’t need to read it to know what it’s about. I don’t need to see the movie. I know what emotional and sexual abuse look like. I know what they feel like. I know all the signs. I am still living in the aftermath. 

Instead I’ve read many of the articles that dissect the story, and from what I’ve gathered there doesn’t even seem to be much dispute about whether or not the relationship between Christian Grey and Anastasia Steele is abusive, but whether or not that matters. Women like this book – that is, after all, how it sold so many copies – so it can’t be problematic, right? It’s just a book. It’s not real. 

But it’s because women like this book that it’s so problematic. The fact that women find this book sexually liberating is so problematic it makes me dizzy. And not because women shouldn’t have sexual agency but because we already so gravely don't and Fifty Shades only reinforces mainstream sexual violence, i.e. heteronormative male sexuality, i.e. that’s why it’s so popular. If the movie was sexually groundbreaking it wouldn’t be opening at $60 million. If the book was sexually groundbreaking it wouldn’t be mainstream. Misogynist beliefs about sex and sexuality are too deeply ingrained in ourselves and our society for millions of women to suddenly become liberated by a story that people around the world recognize as abusive. And I know this attitude can sound patronizing, and I cringe at that, but that’s also because of the nature of abuse – it’s designed to look like something other than abuse, especially in the beginning. Abuse is designed to make you think you like it. And when you don’t like it, abuse is designed to make you think it’s your fault. Something must be wrong with you. What the fuck is wrong with you, he said… Abuse is abuse because it denies the victim agency to fully recognize that what’s happening is abuse. 

I was with my abuser when several of his other victims came forward about his abuse. I wasn’t shocked at their stories (which should have been shocking to me, in the moment), but I felt patronized when anyone tried to tell me I was being abused, and I think that’s because victims are already denied so much agency – by that point my entire life was being dictated by him, his wants, his needs, his moods – that I couldn’t stand yet another person trying to dictate my reality. And besides, listening to those other voices, believing them, would mean I’d have to face reality, to face the real him, but he’d already stripped away so much of my personhood that I didn’t have an “I” with which to face him. I was a nobody. Just a body. And he loved that body. He loved that body more than I had ever loved that body, and, growing up being shamed for my body – by both my father (“hey there, fatty,” “hey there, bubble-butt”), and body-critical American culture, it felt good, for once, to not be ashamed of my body, even though I was depressed, even though he was mean to me, even though I was scared of him, even though he wouldn’t take no for an answer –at least I was sexy as fuck, and I took this distorted thinking as some sort of liberation, some sort of power, when really that was exactly how he wanted me to feel – liberated, beautiful, not abused. 

My psuedo-liberation was a product of his emotional and sexual abuse and only reinforced his control over me. He didn’t love my body – he loved using my body. And he damn did he use it up. If I hated it before I don’t know what to call my relationship with it now. There isn’t one. Numbness.  

Patriarchy at large functions in much the same way – it denies its own existence through pseudo-liberation of marginalized groups, i.e. claiming that something like Fifty Shades  is all about giving women permission to openly talk about sex and is therefore progressive, when what it’s actually doing is further normalizing male narratives of sexual violence, which in turn only reinforces the power of those already in power, i.e. not women.  

And it’s not “just a book.” What is “just a book,” anyway? We shape our reality through language and stories. Language and stories reinforce our attitudes and beliefs about the world. No book is “just a book.” No movie is “just a movie." 

Part of me wishes I was able to read the book myself and draw more specific connections between Christian Grey and my abuser, the similarities and differences between them and how both are important to note – no two abusers are exactly the same, especially since many are very skilled at adapting their tactics to the personality and environment of the victim – but the foundation is the same – manipulation, control, confusion, fear, all wrapped up in a big red bow labeled LOVE. 

A year ago on Valentine’s Day I remember fantasizing about telling someone that my fiancee was abusing me. But am I being abused? I asked myself this so many times, entirely oblivious to the fact that the answer to my question lay in my need to ask it so many times. 

A year ago I was at work, not at all excited for Valentine’s Day. I thought, How could all this rage be love? I was scared to go home, to this apartment. But I went because there was nowhere else to go, and there he was, all showered and clean, with a bottle of champagne and a several-hundred dollar diamond bracelet he’d spent the day searching for at the Mall of America, a handwritten card he’d diligently worked on at the coffee shop. 

I am so in love with you I am so in love with you I am so in love with you 

Over and over I read the card. It was like water in the desert – I was thirsting for affection, romance, emotional intimacy – signs of all the things that had led me here in the first place, signs that I wasn’t crazy, that I wasn’t being abused, that everything would be okay… 

Fifty Shades of Grey is and will continue to be popular and there’s not much I can do about that. Women around the world are and will continue to be abused at alarmingly high rates, and there’s not much I can do about that either. But I’ll keep writing when I can, I’ll keep supporting other victims, and instead of seeing Fifty Shades of Grey I’m going to donate the ten dollars a movie ticket would cost me to The Domestic Violence Relief Fund. I hope you’ll consider doing the same. 

P.S. a few months later I burned that fucking card.