Those Men - Nathan Yockey

You have to look at Medusa straight on to see her. And she's not deadly. She's beautiful  and she's laughing.  

—Helene Cixous 

I once heard an analogy about skepticism  

a dozen baked brownies and one filled with poison,  

from a woman with her head tilted and an eyebrow raised  

asking me if I’d look twice.  

As a kid, I heard stories  

of bulbs flickering as lamps  

smashed against walls fizzled and died out.  

Clumps of hair between clammy fingers as an aunt,  

a sister, a daughter, “fell” down the stairs.  

Echoes from eons-old words bounced off hollow walls  

I told myself I'd never be like them.  

I cupped my hands against my ears as they bled.  

My feet crunched broken ceramic and I squinted to see through black smoke  in houses tyrants tried to burn down on their way out the door.  

It’s a man’s world, and all men  

are wolves in wolves’ clothing – “Not me,  

not me! Not all, not all!” I once heard  

an analogy about skepticism from a woman with her head tilted  

and an eyebrow raised asking me if I’d look twice  

at crossing to the other sidewalk on an evening run, saying  

excuse me hands-free from a lower back on a Saturday at the bar, 

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at being a passive bystander to those men.  

If only one sets the fire but nine do nothing  

all ten still burn.  

I hang my head at pink pepper sprays dangling on every keychain,  

swinging back and forth like a noose for the idealistic “not me, not alls”.  

Delegated drink bodyguards clasp hands over solo cups,  

as phone calls with no one sound into an empty parking garage.  

I watched my dad and learned the tide that could be turned  

when one stood against. Said “I love you” in rooms where  

trusting was making a miracle.  

I watched him bled on by cuts made by a knife he didn’t hold.  

I learned mountains could move by holding tissues with white knuckles  

and the way the echoes grow faint when someone opens a window and lets in the breeze.