House

My tongue is a house full of blood from all the times I had to keep the door shut.
The first sin I committed was being born.
The women in my culture, in my family are second class citizens.
We do not ask questions.
We do not shout.
We wear silence like metal armour because to speak is to be asking for a fight.
To speak about inequity, injustice and everything that is unfair deems me as ignorant.
They tell me I will struggle being a wife, I am too sensitive and I question everything.
My father was the first feminist I met.
In fact he never lets my mum enter the kitchen.
He can’t eat if he is not in the company of my mother.
But the men in my culture wear misogyny like a trophy.
Laugh when I tell them I want to marry a man who will never let me enter the kitchen.
Who can only eat in my company.
Apparently I’m unrealistic, paralysed in a mythical land.
My university professor told me that a man can rape his wife because she is his property.
I choked on the blood in my mouth, swallowed it and unbolted the door.
Grabbed the closest thing to me and killed him.
Is what I wanted to do…
Instead, I coughed and winced my face, cried at my silence when I got home, cried from frustration, cried for my blessings.