Kim Noriega

Name Me

The power of naming is at least two-fold: naming defines the quality and value of that which

is named—and it also denies reality and value to that which is never named, never uttered.

That which has no name, that for which we have no words or concepts, is rendered mute

and invisible: powerless to inform or transform our consciousness or our experience, our

understanding, our vision; powerless to claim its own existence. . . . This has been the

situation of women in our world.

—Barbara Dubois as quoted in Convicted Survivors: The Imprisonment

of Battered Women Who Kill, by Elizabeth Dermody Leonard

Name me the girl

with the slate-blue eyes,

the girl who sits under the apple tree,

your apple-cheeked bride.

Name me your lover—

the mother of your eight-pound baby boy.

Name me sugar lips.

Name me honey-girl.

Name me sweet potato pie.

Name me the woman

with the black-and-blue eye.

Name me white roses.

Name me I swear, baby.

Name me crushed larynx.

Name me fractured mandible.

Name me but I was high, baby;

it don’t count when you’re high.

Name me whore.

Name me get in that fuckin’ kitchen,

bitch.

Name me dislocated shoulder.

Name me what ya gonna do,

have me arrested?

Name me I dare you

to try and leave me.

Name me the woman

with seven broken toes.

Name me the cunt

you tell not to make

a sound.

Name me tramp, slut, ugly

ball and chain.

Name me the woman you love

to get up against the wall

and fuck with your .38.

Name me the woman

who found the dog

lying in a pool of blood

outside our daughter’s door.

Name me the one who dug

the dog’s grave; posted lost signs

the next day with our kids.

Name me the mother of children

who will never be safe.

Name me sleepless.

Name me the little missus

who bought a 9-millimeter.

Name me shows no remorse,

name me guilty as charged.

Name me not sorry.

Name me widow.

Name me the woman in cell C-15.

Name me free.

(Originally published in Paris Atlantic.)

Moi Aussi

for Gisèle Pelicot

She tells me that her

husband keeps a jar

of Vaseline on the shelf

above their bed, which

has a headboard with

a mirror in which (he’s

told her) he loves to watch

himself taking her while

she sleeps,

even though she has told

him that she doesn’t want

him to do this, tells him,

please don’t. But that’s not

rape, she asks, is it? I

mean, he’s my husband,

and like he always says,

I’ve ‘never thrown the jar

out’ so, isn’t that consent?

Is that consent?