Worldwide, almost one-third (27%) of women aged 15–49 years who have been in a relationship report that they have been subjected to some form of physical and/or sexual violence by their intimate partner.
This poem, ‘baby blue’ is a nod to those people, a ‘you’re not alone’, an ‘I see you.’
baby blue.
I’ll be trying to unsee what he did to me for the rest of my life
but
at least he was so kind as to let me stay alive.
Even if what he did to me goes around and around my fucking mind,
for which I can’t escape
as much as I try.
Even tried to starve myself to get rid of the flesh
that he touched that night,
but to no avail because it’s always there.
The feeling of his hands in my hair,
pulling my head back
‘I want you to look at me when I do this to you.’
I’ve never been good at eye contact, but when a metaphorical gun is being held to your head you better believe that I stared.
Blue.
I always associated blue eyes with the prince in all the Disney films,
the knight in shining armor
until I met you.
Baby blue.
baby.
blue.
The realisation that you are someone’s son,
‘What would your mother think of you?’…
Don’t say it,
don’t say it,
don’t say i..
t comes out.
I pass out,
wake up in the hospital.
My boyfriend’s there.
Said I called him to pick me up last night
‘pissed out my brain’,
said he tried to walk me home
but I kept pushing him away,
saying something about his mother;
‘She’s been dead 20 years, had you been doing coke?’
I can’t answer.
‘I don’t remember anything, I must have been really out of it’,
I say
‘and…
my head hurts.’
Feeling the back of my head,
loose hair.
Fragments of memory
of you pulling it,
pulling me
onto you.
Baby blue.
baby.
blue.
Hitting me.
It hits me like he hit me,
full force-
d to the ground,
passing out,
waking up in this stupid hospital gown
…
Baby blue.
baby.
blue.
I’d recognise those eyes anywhere.
‘I want you to look at me when I say this to you…‘
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