The Morning After Sexual Assault/Chapel by Ahja Fox

There is a boy in the library eating

blue and purple erasers today

his smirk is an open wound

 

When he sits, an onyx rosary

swings from his belt

you can’t label this pain                                not yet

not in the presence of Jesus’ thorned crown 

 

That is what your mother would say

that Jesus had it worse                 that he died

for the boy across the room who

holds your voice with his fist

 

                (calls you "sister" which appears more distant than cousin somehow)

 

And he brands you bittersweet

as if your body is a Hershey’s bar

                                split diagonally

 

You will kill him                  in your thoughts

then put him back together again

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Ahja Fox is an avid reader, dancer, and researcher of all things morbid and supernatural. Her other passion is acting as co-host/ co-partner of Art of Storytelling (a reading series in Denver, Colorado). You can find her work published or forthcoming in Driftwood Press, Rigorous, Noctua Review, The Perch, and more. Stay up-to-date on her reading/performance schedule and publications by following her on Instagram and Twitter at aefoxx.