Oprah

by Rosie

Posted to Poetry on 2003-04-18 10:26:00

had a show on yesterday
on young middle school
teenage girls
undergoing abusive relationships
and how this goes on to affect them
in the future

Oprah explained
so much influence is being packed into boys
to be thug-like these days
and women impossibly
distortedly beautiful
“bitches” in fact, not worthy of respect
affecting kids in detrimental ways

the media.

yet, older couples…
this has been going on forever
i never could understand how older women
undergoing domestically violent marriages
could stay put

one of the girls blurted
her spirit felt broken
—

a while back i watched
Instict with anthony hopkins
he works with gorillas
there’s this caged gorilla there
in a scene, Hopkins explains to cuba gooding jr
even if you open the cage
the gorilla won’t leave because
it’s spirit has been broken
it wouldn’t know how to survive in the wild anyway
and it’s almost a cruelty to set him free now
we see the same
in the Shawshank Redemption
—

their spirit breaks

more than the media is at blame of course
and women do survive these situations
but that’s not the point
we should be taking steps forward
not backwards

it’s just hard to digest
this stuff is still a major problem in our society
so common
and not getting much better.