Mercy

by Andrea Dworkin

  an absence, a bare vibration; but he w asn’t a trick, he was a

  cute boy, true love and real romance, remember him I instruct

  m yself because it’s hard, rape’s hard, remem bering’s hard,

  they have to break so much there’s no deep deep enough to

  bury it in, they leave you with crushed bones, diced nerves,

  live nerves, sliced nerves as if someone took a knife to the

  nerve endings themselves, not so they are cut dead but so they

  are being sliced each minute o f forever, and they don’t go

  dead, there’s not half a second o f numbness or paralysis, the

  nerves are open and alive and being hit by the air, exposed, and

  the knife is cutting into them thread by thread, they’re stringy

  and the knife’s pulling them apart, and you got an acute pain

  and a loud scream, high decibels, ringing in your ears, a

  torture ringing in your ears, and it don’t let you sleep and you

  don’t get forgetfulness, your eyes cry blood and you got open

  sores, the lips o f your labia get boils, big boils; you got a

  vagina with long, deep tears, an ass that rips open with blood

  every time you shit, because it’s the penis again, oversized,

  pulling out after haying torn its w ay in; and then you will

  remember rape; these are the elements o f m em ory, constant,

  true, and perpetual pain and otherwise you will forget— we are

  a legion o f zombies— because it burns out a piece o f your

  brain, it’s the scorched earth policy for the sweetmeat in your

  head, the rape recipe, braise, sear, burn bare, there’s a sudden

  conflagration on the surface o f your brain, a piece o f one

  hemisphere or the other is burned bare, blank, and you lose

  w hatever’s there; ju st gone; whatever; so rape’s a tw o-

  pronged attack, on your body, in you, on your brain, in you;

  on freedom, on memory; you might as well bury yourself in

  the backyard, or throw yourself in a trash can, you’re like

  some dumb cat or dog that got hit by a car, run over and died;

  only they let the shells o f dead girls walk around because hell it

  makes no difference to them if what they stick it in is living or

  dead; w hat’s left, darling, is fine, according to the formula, a

  girl frail and female, a skeleton with a fleshy pudendum, ready

  to serve, these girls are ghosts, did you see, did you notice,

  where are they, w hy ain’t they here, present, on earth, why

  can’t you find them even if you look for them in the light, how

  come they don’t know anything or do anything, how come

  they ain’t anything, how come they are shaking and flitting

  around and apologizing and begging and afraid and drugged

  and stupid even if they are smart; how come they are comatose

  even when they’re awake? He pushes it in, she pushes it out, a

  dead spot in the brain marks the spot, there’s a teeny little

  cemetery in her brain, lots o f torched spots, suttee; we bleed

  both ends, literal, little strokes every time there’s a rape, time

  gone, hours or days or weeks, words gone, self gone, memory

  wiped out, severely impaired; I cannot remember— how do

  you exist? The skills, the tricks; tie your shoes; wrap ropes

  around your heart, or was it your wrists; or was it ankles;

  neck; I’d make a list if I could remember; I’d memorize the list

  i f someone else would write it down; or I try, I scribble big

  letters, confused, misspelled, on the page; or I look at the

  words, meaningless, and draw a blank; I make a list,

  misspelled words signifying I don’t remember what; or I draw

  a picture, I use crayons, o f what? I try to say what I try to

  remember; the skills, the tricks, language, yesterday. There

  are little rape strokes, erased places in the brain, eruptions o f

  blood, explosions, like geysers, it’s flooded, places on the

  brain, blood’s acidic, did you ever sit in a pool o f your own

  blood, it wears the skin o ff you, chafes, irritates, the skin peels

  off; so too in the brain, the skin peels off; I’ve been there, a

  poor, dear, quiet thing, naked like a baby, in a river o f blood,

  mine, curled up; fetal, as if m y mama took me back. There’s

  wounds and you sit in the blood. Why can’t I remember? I am

  a stroke victim, a shadow in the night, invisible in the night, a

  ghostly thing, in the night, amnesiac, wandering, in the night,

  not out to whore, just what’s left, the remains, on the stroll;

  taking a walk, pastoral, romantic, an innocent walk, lost in

  memories, lost in fog, lost in dark; having forgotten; but I got

  muscles packed with memory; hard, thick, solid, from the

  positions reenacted, down on m y knees, down on m y back; I

  got memories packed in m y bones, because m y brain don’t

  make distinctions no more; can’t tell him from him from him;

  I have an intuitive dread; o f him and him and him; there’s a

  heightened anxiety; I’m a nervous girl, Victorian nerves,

  strain, a delicate constitution in the sense that m y brain is frail,

  pale; but m y muscles is packed, it’s adrenaline, from fear;

  there’s a counterproductive side to creating too much fear, it’s

  a meta-amphetamine, it’s meta-speed, it’s meta-coke, it’s

  more testosterone than thou, I got a body packed with rage,

  you ever seen rage all stored up like a treasure in the body o f a

  woman? I don’t need no full capacity brain, as you so

  eloquently have insisted; I got sunstrokes in my head, enough

  daylight to carry me through any darkness, I am lit up from

  inside, a bursting sun; brain light. I am a citizen o f the night,

  on a stroll, no dark places keep secrets from me, I am drawn to

  them by a secret radiance, the light that emanates from the

  human heart, some poor bum, a poor man, poor fucking

  drunk somewhere in the shadows hiding his poor drunk heart

  in the dark, but I find him, I see the pure light o f his pure heart,

  I find him, some asshole, a vagrant, clutching his bottle, and I

  like them big, I like them hairy, their skin’s red and bulbous,

  all swelled from drinking, they’re mean, they’d kill you for the

  fucking bottle they’re clutching to them, sometimes they got

  it buried under them, and they’re curled up on cardboard or

  newspapers on the street, all secure in the shadows, manly

  men, behind garbage cans, hidden in the dark; but the light in

  them reaches out to the light in me, my brothers, myself, I

  pick on men at least twice my size, I like them with fine

  shoulders, wide, real men, I like them six feet or more, I like

  them vicious, I pick them big and mean, the danger psyches

  me up but what I appreciate is their surprise, which is absolute,

  their astonishment, which invigorates me; how easy it is to

  make them eat shit; they will always underestimate me,

  always, from which I enunciate the political principle, Alw ays

  pick on men at least twice your size. This is the value o f

  practice as opposed to theory; they’re so easy; so arrogant; so

  used to the world always being the w ay they thought it was.

  The small ones are harder. The small ones have to le
arn to

  fight early and take nothing for granted, the small, w iry ones

  you cannot surprise; when I am a master I will take on the

  small, w iry ones; or assign them to someone else, maybe

  someone who can step on them, a real tall girl who would get

  something out o f it by just treating them like bugs; but now I

  take the big ones, and I fucking smash their faces in; I kick

  them; I hit them; I kick them blind; I like smashing their faces

  in with one kick, I like dancing on their chests, their rheumy

  old chests, with my toes, big, swinging kicks, and I like one

  big one between the legs, for the sake o f form and symbolism,

  to pay my respects to content as such, action informed by the

  imperatives o f literature. Sometimes they got knives or

  bottles, they’re fast, they’re good, but they are fucking drunk

  and all sprawled out, and I like smashing the bottles into their

  fucking faces and I like taking the knives, for my collection; I

  like knives. I find them drunk and lying down and I hurt them

  and I run; and I fucking don’t care about fair; discuss fair at the

  U . N .; vote on it; from which I enunciate another political

  principle, It is obscene for a girl to think about fair. Every girl

  needs a man, gets an itch, the nights are long, I’m restless, it’s

  not natural for a girl to be alone, without a man; instead o f

  locking the windows and locking the doors and waiting for

  one to crawl in I go out to find him; not ladylike but selfdetermining, another girl for choice; a girl needs someone big and strong, a macho man, a streetwise, street tough, street

  crazy man, a hero o f freedom, a loose man, unattached, a

  solitary poet o f drink and darkness, a city prince; I have always

  found that a girl needs a boy. These ones are old and mean;

  none o f them’s innocent and who cares? I fucking don’t care.

  It’s been justified up m y ass. Besides it’s just sport, recreational

  training, some ways to get through the night, means and

  methods, because I can’t sleep, because if you go to sleep they

  will hurt you, one o f them or some o f them or some other o f

  them; whoever these ones hurt, I’m taking her place, whoever

  she was, they don’t know us apart, cunt is cunt is cunt, I’m

  taking her place now, when I choose, I’m standing in for her

  now, when it’s good for me; is it good for you? And there’s

  one will stand in for me. There’s anonymous women m oving

  through the night; I have m y husband here, right in front o f

  me, I have a gun to his head, I pull the trigger, it is an

  execution, m y right, any time, any place; his life is mine,

  because he hurt me; dreadful; a dreadful hurt. I want him

  executed so I can be free o f fear; and if there was justice I could

  do it any time, any place; I’d have the gun; I’d have the choice;

  I’d have the right. I think I have a twin in the night, some girl

  standing in for me; who will just smash his fucking head in. I

  think one day they will gather, the women, outside where he

  lives, I think there will be thousands o f them, I think it will be a

  crowd, a mob, a riot, a revolution, and I think they will chant

  his name, and I think they will surround his house, and I think

  they will block the city streets for blocks, and I think they will

  stop traffic, and I think no one will be able to pass in or out and

  they w ill stop the police from getting to him to protect him

  because they will stretch for miles and someone, an unknown

  someone, will kill him, it will be one and it will be all and no

  one will ever know who except for her herself, they will smash

  him or shoot him or knife him, or fifty will knife him, or a

  hundred, but so it’s final, not making a mistake, they will kill

  him good and real and quick, and no one will know who,

  because it will be all o f them; for me; do this; for me; and when

  an indictment is read they will all stand up; for me; including

  the ones who heard me scream and including the ones who

  weren’t born yet. M y eyes work. I see. It is not a mystery. If

  it’s in front o f you you can see how it works itself out. It’s not

  prophecy; it’s simple seeing; what is there; now; naked from

  the lies. I see the future, a pretty place. The men make a sex

  circus, we are the performing animals. There are hoops o f fire,

  we are chained in cages, they whip us to make us jum p: high

  enough for them to look under. We jum p, we hop, we spread

  our legs; they’ll paint us purple underneath; or shave us so we

  look like babies; or put brands on us, or chains through us,

  underneath; they’ll hurt us, more; more than now; more;

  killing w on ’t be enough; rape will be the good old days, when

  it was simple, how they just forced us, in private, or how they

  just beat us, with fists, in private, or how they put fingers

  inside us, when we were too small, underneath; w e’ll be the

  dog-and-pony show; they’ll leash us and they’ll manacle us

  and they’ll paint us pink and w e’ll have nostalgia for the good

  old days when the living was easy before they grabbed us o ff

  the streets in vans and gang-raped us and bashed us with

  baseball bats, smashing us not looking where, arms, head,

  chest, stomach, legs, and filmed it, and dumped us, some o f us

  lived, some o f us died, or before they set dogs on us to fuck us,

  and filmed it, or before they cut us open, to ejaculate on us,

  and filmed it, or before they started urinating on us, using us

  like common toilets, to film it; but I don’t expect to be listened

  to or believed, certainly even the simplest things o f an already

  distinguished life cannot be believed, I couldn’t say anything

  simple in the whole course o f m y actual life and have there be

  belief; as if justice for me, from him to me, could count; but I

  been through that; m y grievances on that score are between

  the lines, at least there, always read the white space; I’m tired

  from it and I’m sad; Walt could say blah blah blah this will

  come and this will come and this will be and he was venerated

  for dreaming, as i f his dreams was true dreams o f a true future;

  m y nightmares are true dreams o f a true future. I’m not alone;

  though I can’t find them; in the dark raped girls wander;

  smashing drunks; sometimes someone sets one on fire; I see

  the flames; I smell the carcass; the raped have stopped being

  kind, generally speaking, though it’s still a secret. I personally

  have done the following. I have blown up several rape

  emporiums. I don’t have bombs or explosives but I cannot be

  stopped. I steal a car; I back it into the rape emporium when it’s

  deserted; I make a fuse to the gas tank; I light the fuse; the

  whole thing blows; it’s simple, if a bit extravagant. Any man

  will follow any feminine looking thing down any dark alley;

  I’ve always wanted to see a man beaten to a shit bloody pulp

  with a high-heeled shoe stuffed up his mouth, sort o f the pig

  with the apple; it would be good to put him on a serving plate

  but yo u ’d need good silver. Y o
u ’re the piece o f ass; he’s

  invulnerable, o f course; it’s his right, to come after you; so if

  he follow s you and you have the urge to smash him to death

  he’s asked for it, hasn’t he? I mean, he actually did ask for it.

  The arm y o f raped ghosts got together and we marched, we

  marched, we marched in Tim es Square and the Tenderloin

  and Soho; we marched; everyw here there’s neon w e’ve

  marched; we visit the slave auctions; we have the names o f the

  pimps, addresses, photos, telephone numbers, social security

  numbers; I plaster their neighborhoods with pictures o f them;

  I say they are pimps who slaughter wom en for fun and money;

  I say he’s at your P . T . A ., he’s with your children; I pursue

  him; the army o f raped ghosts stays on his tail; we drive him

  out. They hide; they run. One day the women will burn down

  Tim es Square; I’ve seen it in m y mind; I know; it’s in flames.

  The women will come out o f their houses from all over and

  they will riot and they will burn it down, raze it to the ground,

  it will be bare cement; and we will execute the pimps. N o

  woman will ever be hurt there again; ever; again; it is a simple

  fact. I threw blood all over their weaponry; their whips; their

  chains; their spiked dildos; their leashes; I have buckets o f

  blood, nurses give it to me, raped nurses; and I cover

  everything, the slave clothes, the bikinis, the nighties, the

  garter belts, and the things they tie you down with and the

  things they stick up you and the things they hurt you with,

  nipple clips and piercing things; I drench them in blood; I

  make them blood-soaked, as is a w om an’s life; I think over

  time I will engage in a new art, painting their world blood red

  as they have painted mine; simple self-expression, with a

  political leaning but neither right nor left per se, the anti-rape

  series it will be called, with real life as the canvas; and I will try

  to make the implicit explicit; a poet said, make the implicit

  explicit; a political theorist said, make the implicit explicit; the

  blood o f women is implicit in the weaponry; I will take the