Oppressexion Poetry collection by: Innah Johanee P. Alaman CW – 121 The Withering The arid land thirsts under the glaring sun. The wind‟s blistering breeze blows occasionally. The arid land hardens, crumbles beneath my feet. The desiccated cries of my children are left wedged between the cracks and the crevices of this dry land. Five months without rain, five months without him He who went to rally against the authority against their tanks of water kept hidden inside their high walls to flush their shit, wash their ass, brush the grime off their teeth after three square meals. Their belching mocks the growling in our stomachs. Five months without rain, five months without news of him I know my husband‟s protests won‟t make the rain pour Or make the rich mayor help us poor. But our landlord can, I think I can let him fit himself in my concavity for a bag of rice. The long April fades into a hot night and he fills me with the harrowing truth that I am left even more hollow than before, with deeper stabs in my heart. In the dark, I see nothing, but a silhouette of a greedy dog feasting on an abandoned meat, panting deeply, growling – nothing but the dry friction grating the folds of my skin. The drought stole my pride, stripped off my clothes, kneaded every inch of my skin, pounded me to a pulp as I clung into a wet pool of sweat, blood, saliva, and tears. I close my eyes. I see my kids, their belly and throat singed with warm broth, with corn meal mush. Morning came and he too. The sun‟s fault-finding light slapped me, stung me. I snatched from his hand my last night‟s wage. I dare not look back as I tread the barren field– my home, where I know what the deprived crops feel when they wither in the arid land, my homeland, where I have lived and died in. Web A body, at fifteen, unwrapped, raw between split robe – quivers before the intimate eyes of her lover. A body, at fifteen, moans mute in photos. Her soft limbs, small mouth, (stroke scenes) in the minds of the uninvited. Every inch of her skin exposed, posed viewed over and over again, like an animal in a museum, most beautiful when dead and preserved. The young love once again tells a tale of a nymph taken out of the water caught in a web, sprawled like a carcass, suspended in the air on the invisible thread. The predators are out, feeding on fragile innocence on the web – the rotten smell of their lustful gaze, their musk, their words, penetrate her. But the web knows not of the nymph and the stories behind her purple bruises hidden beneath the palette of her skin when they look at her lips, when they use her lips, share her lips, and tell them it‟s not pretty after a quick fantasized sex And the web knows not of the predators who feast on the nymph pleading don‟t come don‟t come yet they come. Consent When the bed reeks of alcohol, behind locked doors, drawn curtains, his fingers dance like carving nightmares blades on my skin and the old wounds open itself again. A wife, a mother of two, still afraid of a monster not under the bed, but beside me. Bruised intimately: our bed becomes a grave of a dismembered body: of dead eyes, limping arms, lips muted to silence, and a hole to be stabbed over and over again. But the scars run deeper than most can see. I wish to peel myself off of me. But do I have the right to refuse to his whims when he wishes to taste my mouth, my body stripped of clothes only draped in insecurity? But do I have the right to refuse to be pushed against the wall, to be clawed by his nails in a dark alley, where his backhand slap leaves me numb? But do I have the right to refuse to be toyed, humped, ploughed, plunged in my sleep in the guise of his sweet brutality and passionate torture? Or did the validity of my consent ended When I said “I do?” First Date on a Sink He peels off my clothes, makes noise for the both of us, goes on and on, moves on his own as he takes this mouth, this wound and jabs it rapidly, forcefully without a pang of affection. (did he confuse my sobs to a moan) (did my helplessness turn him on) On bathroom sink, swept under the rug of shame are my tears as I am assumed guilty until proven otherwise. But am I at fault? A lone daisy in flush pink waits its whole life to blossom to greet the sun, to sway at the wind. And yet a bee so thirsty, salivating, pierces the daisy, and sucks its sweet pink tenderness. (But could the flower be blamed) (did its beauty tempt the bee) Or did the bee just felt like an animal – and animals don‟t know sin. They say the bee just has its needs. The flower is just so inviting, agonizingly beautiful, irresistible, open, and free, that the last thing one would believe is the innocence of the flower consumed against its will. But I am nothing like a delicate flower – a victim in mute tears he tried to carve me into. I too is a sexual being who might have given him herpes. Jennifer Jennifer Laude‟s death would have caused an outcry – if she wasn‟t a transgendered. -Meredith Talusan, The Guardian The lips which found me in a dark corner of a bar was that of a white boy – a soldier without a war, who adores my flat chest, bony hips, and thin limbs – the beauty of starvation in a Third World country. Under the dim holy motel lights, the sinful angels sing and rejoice as his tongue licks my brown skin as I taste his bitter sweet member as he grapples in the dark to fill me as I raise my hips and to meet his as we reach the white glory of ecstasy, the heavenly kingdom we are banished from (silence after his last jerk) He cups my small dress in his hand, pulls off my wig, and berates me– I will never be the woman I am trying to be. My white boy, drunk and high, so homesick that he has to inhabit my bones, conquer my body, my temple with his fist, he adds blue black to my make-up, paints my body in red (oozing from bullets paving inside), and for the final touch, he shoves down the neck of a broken glass bottle up in my ass. I shiver as his pale cold fingers part my eyelids, so I can see him get away, because he can. Hunger in the Alley The bruised sky pours our bed of carton floats along the sidewalk‟s murky waters. We seek shelter in a narrow alley and I fit inside your worn-out shirt printed with a promise “Grassroots Will Grow” (a laughable scheme) We snort in derision until your stomach rumbled and you turned away – red-faced. No, it‟s okay, surrender to hunger, feed on my body, my love. For a moment forget food and crave for the delight between my thin thighs. In this desolate rain, all I have is the warmth from your spent hands fondling me, squeezing me. I shiver not because of the cold but of the heat from being soaking wet. You ease yourself inside and followed the rhythm of the heavy pounding of rain. Oh anguished in bliss, aching in tight places, I cry out your name, silently, smilingly, filled and sated by our fire. Until the sharp clawing pain grew sharper in my tummy. Hungry, I dropped on my knees in front of you, and pray to eat you. Caged Lovers We pray when we‟re sad. We laugh when we‟re sad. We brawl when we‟re sad. We fuck when we‟re sad. Inmates, cellmates, bunkmates mate. The novice always learns these the hard way, with tantrums rammed face, busted anus, and hateful submission – the painful love of a brother On cramped beds we share the agony of useless hours behind bars. On the walls, we mark our territories – with names and number (the evidences of our existence). we do not wish to forget We breathe in rust, musk, sweat, urine, and newly-flushed shit: our nostrils wonted scents – that a vanilla-scented woman walking along our cages sends us hooting. Under our cardboard pillows are cut outs of calendar girls teasing us with their tits, we oblige, the silky pages we crust with our semen. On chilly nights, where a killer fucks a rapist like me, I let him. My brother, warming himself up on me, pounds the night away. Must not moan. Only grunt Or stay silent, don‟t groan, scrunch your face like you don‟t like it. The creaking bed knows how much how hard he loves you, so forget that he enjoyed ten other boys. One should not count the lovers, but how much love was shared. Tongue She thrusts out her lower lip, pouts, and she sticks out her small tongue in shape of a „V‟ – slicing her mouth into a wet slit of crimson thin lips. Her tongue, rosy pink, glistens with saliva. So supple and hot, everything she licks melts, except me. Words roll on her slick tongue easily. She thrusts out her lower lip, pouts, sticks out her small tongue I hate to adore, so sweet, dirty, at times ticklish as a feather, but mostly sharp I wish to blunt it. Cut it. Mute her at last. Her lips would taste the same for me, only sweeter. Like an engine at work, her humming is all I need to hear. Incessant Like when it‟s pitch dark in a moonless night and the door creaks open and a weight rests on your bed side and a man, wasted, tries to finger you and you, being a good ten-year-old girl, say, uncle what are you doing, and he unbuckles his belt, drops his pants, and climbs up on you, his flaccid dick in your face now, you say, I‟m sorry please no, you‟re dirty uncle, and he gets angry then, seething, sucks your mouth, his teeth gnawing your lips while tweaking your tiny blossoming breasts between his fingertips, while you, gasping for air, maintain composure, because this is the brother of your father, even if he‟s humping your hips like a horse in heat, even if his hands squeeze your head into place like a bolt tightly screwed, your body as motionless as your father taught you to be when he uses you in bed, and maybe you pitied your uncle whom at fifty had his heart broken by his wife who cheated on him with another woman, bruising his inflated ego, and so you tolerate this floundering over your soiled body, until your father storms inside the room, with a glint in his eye, drags his brother outside and comes back to finish what he started. Hilda, 1983 It's like you just want to feel you are dead. -Hilda Narciso,Philippine Inquirer on Martial Law In the dead of the night, when the streets are cold and empty, the lamplight flickers at the end of the street like watchful fluttering eyes I must hide from. 11 PM. Past curfew. The soldiers are out in their leather boots, with their loaded guns. Four more blocks from home. I walk along the shadow of Balete trees. In the dead of the night The rowdy men in their patrol car stop. I hug my slippers tight, my bare toes peeking from my long saya, hoping not to make a sound. They stop in front of the Balete, their flashlights glaring at me, I shrink away. I know the drill. They say hop on, they will bring me home, I said no, sir. I can walk home alone. No, sir, I am not a rebel at all. In the dead of the night, under the pale moonlight, dragged further into a safe house, detained, six men, knifed through my clothes, chewed on my skin, bucking at every hole in my body. Only to spit out my bones, my soul. In the dead of the night, in the outskirts of a ghost town, my screams grew weary and thin, drowned by the drone of crickets, the howling of dogs. Six men left me half-dead, left a rotten fish tucked between my legs. In the dead of the night, I became like the streets gaping open, cold, and empty. In the dead of the night.
