Réka

“Went to the Zoo, I said to Him- Something about that chimpanzee over there reminds me of you.”
― Carol Ann Duffy, The World's Wife

“- Hogy lehet valaki ilyen törékeny, és amellett ilyen hajlíthatatlan? - kérdezte fogcsikorgatva. - A dereka olyan a tenyeremben, mint a nádszál. - Alaposan megrázott, mikor ezt mondta. - Két ujjam között szét tudnám morzsolni, de mi hasznom lenne belőle? Hogy néz! Milyen elszántan, milyen kihívóan, milyen megvetően! Ez több, mint bátorság, ez kegyetlen diadal. Akármit csinálok a kalitkájával, nem jutok közelebb ehhez a szépséges, vad teremtéshez. Ha szétszaggatom, eltöröm a börtönét, a fogoly lélek kiszabadul: hiába vennék erőt a házán, az égbe röppen, mielőtt a halandó testet birtokomba vehetném. Én téged akarlak, lélek, a te akaratodat és energiádat, a te erényedet és ártatlanságodat, nem pusztán ezt a törékeny testet. Ha magadtól jönnél, idesimulnál a szívemre; de ha akaratod ellenére ejtelek rabul, akkor kisiklasz a karomból, mint valami lidérc, és eltűnsz, mielőtt illatodat belélegezhetném. Jane, szerelmem, jöjj!”
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“But life, they said, means life. Dying inside.
The Devil was evil, mad, but I was the Devil's wife
which made me worse. I howled in my cell.
If the Devil is gone then how could this be hell?”
― Carol Ann Duffy, The World's Wife

“Cold, I was, like snow, like ivory.
I thought "He will not touch me",
but he did.

He kissed my stone-cool lips.
I lay still
as though I’d died.
He stayed.
He thumbed my marbled eyes.

He spoke -
blunt endearments, what he’d do and how.
His words were terrible.
My ears were sculpture,
stone-deaf shells.
I heard the sea.
I drowned him out.
I heard him shout.

He brought me presents, polished pebbles,
little bells.
I didn’t blink,
was dumb.
He brought me pearls and necklaces and rings.
He called them girly things.
He ran his clammy hands along my limbs.
I didn’t shrink,
played statue, shtum.

He let his fingers sink into my flesh,
he squeezed, he pressed.
I would not bruise.
He looked for marks,
for purple hearts,
for inky stars, for smudgy clues.
His nails were claws.
I showed no scratch, no scrape, no scar.
He propped me up on pillows,
jawed all night.
My heart was ice, was glass.
His voice was gravel, hoarse.
He talked white black.

So I changed tack,
grew warm, like candle wax,
kissed back,
was soft, was pliable,
began to moan,
got hot, got wild,
arched, coiled, writhed,
begged for his child,
and at the climax
screamed my head off -
all an act.

And haven’t seen him since.
Simple as that”
― Carol Ann Duffy, The World's Wife