day TWO HUNDRED and EIGHTY NINE

i was there

i was there

when they huddled

around those girls

on the playground

and made up chants about

how their breasts hadn’t developed

like the others

i was there

every single time one of us

called them a bitch

i was there in the club that night

when they pinched the asses

of a whole row of women

and i saw the look in their eyes

as they turned them my way

i was there when he grabbed her

dragged her on the dance floor

and forced her to dance

and i was there trying to break them up

felt when she pushed us both

and went heading for the bouncers

i was there when they screamed

JEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW

outside the window of a car

in a hasidic neighborhood

i didn’t like it

but i didn’t say shit

i was there that time when my only black friend

overheard the only black joke

that ever came out of my mouth

and i was there when i apologized

only to watch him walk away

i was there when we were nineteen

and he took that fifteen year old

into the woods

and made me sit on a bench with her friend

to keep her company

or “do whatever you want.”

while he did whatever he did

but it didn’t matter because she didn’t complain

and i was there when he had his fist hovering

over his girlfriend

her hair wild

his nose bloody from a fight i’d missed

as their four month old baby screamed and cried

on a nearby couch

i was also there that time

i made my girlfriend cry for taking my virginity

for having had other men before me

for having had a life

that i couldn’t wrap around my head

i was there

watching human beings get treated like

toys for the taking on subways and buses

i was there when he

harassed that bartender in wheeling that night

and stole her tip money when she wasn’t looking

i was there

and i knew the rumors about how he pushed that one

how he hit that one

and how he threatened the other with the same

but i made no further inquiries

i was there the night jane cried

when he yelled at her over a fucking movie

i was there

when sixty-three percent of men who looked like me

elected a rapist, misogynist, liar

the scion of white male privilege

into the highest office in the land

and i was there when he said

grab ‘em by the pussy

i was there when they chanted lock her up!

lock her up!

lock her up!

even though the whole show was over

and i was there in washington d.c.

with pussy hats and protests

learning how to shut up and listen

but i was still there

all those years he forced himself on women and children

made them give him blow jobs for movie roles

raped them

harassed them

killed careers with his power

i was there

and i paid my ticket to stand in line with all the others

to be entertained

by the whole sick show.

--John Grochalski