Decency by Emily Jungmin Yoon

Decency

 

When a man threw his fist into a wall next to my eye

I said that was love, that love was rage.

I was in the habit of loving anyone who laid a cold hand

on my face and said he’d pray for me.

Or anyone who prays. I thought apology

was love and so I loved to hear a man say sorry.

I loved to forgive because it meant I was a goddess. I forgave

because he couldn’t possibly forgive himself.

There’s a demon inside me, he said. Who cares if it’s a demon

when it is mine and I am greedy for it. No, there isn’t, and

I don’t care, do you hear me?—I’d say, and greed seemed to river

through my body. Even years later I could not speak of men

and their violence because I wanted to believe, yes,

in such a thing as decency in men I loved. That my love

was decent. All the men who wanted me beautiful,

wanted me thin, wanted me with short hair, wanted me less

smart, wanted me, wanted me not, wanted me with pink

cheeks, wanted the best for me, wanted me in ruffled

skirts, wanted me naked, wanted me dead, all the men

who wanted me, men who wanted, men who are

gone, not gone enough.