A gender-inclusive anthology of poetry and prose that addresses the physical and psychological act of being “grabbed,” or in any way assaulted.
The #MeToo movement, the infamous Access Hollywood tape, and the depraved and hypocritical actions of celebrities, politicians, CEOs, and other powerful people have caused people all over the nation to speak out in outrage, to express allegiance for the victims of these assaults, and to raise their voices against a culture that has allowed this behavior to continue for too long.
The editors asked writers and poets to add to the conversation about what being “grabbed” means to them in their own experience or in whatever way the word “grabbed” inspired them. What they received are often searing, heart-rending works, ranging in topic from sexual misconduct to racial injustice, from an unwanted caress to rape, expressed in powerful, beautifully crafted prose and poetry.
The writers represented here, some very well known, such as Rita Dove, Jericho Brown, Eileen Miles, Ana Menendez and Sapphire, as well as some newer voices not yet fully discovered, have mined their collective experiences to reveal their most vulnerable moments, and in some cases, to narrate moments that they have had previously been unwilling or unable to speak of. What results is a collection of emotional, hard-hitting pieces that speak to the aftermath of violation—whether mental, emotional, or physical.
“A richly diverse, creative, and gender-inclusive anthology . . . at once deeply shocking and shockingly commonplace, writing candidly, devastatingly, sometimes wittily. With a defining introduction by Joyce Maynard and a resounding afterword by Anita Hill, this is a universal and clarifying call to break the long silence that has imprisoned so many in pain and self-blame. With many contributors writing about being ‘grabbed’ when they were children or teens, this is a hard-hitting, enlightening, and empowering collection for YAs.”
—Booklist, Starred Review
Foreword
Joyce Maynard
Preface
Caridad Moro
I. STRANGERS
What We Did This Year
Freesia McKee
The Truth Is I Never Left You
Alexandra Lytton Regalado
Sweet Sixteen
Brenda Cárdenas
She Said Stop Here
Cynthia White
Found Poem: Chorus to a Girl
Holly Mitchell
Flashbulb Memory
Iris Jamahl Dunkle
Kidnapped Girls
Catherine Gonick
Hitchhiker
Cynthia White
Tuesdays
Yvonne Cassidy
Duplex
Jericho Brown
Sawdust
David Moscovich
Doctor’s Office First Week in This Country
Javier Zamora
Dispatch from My Early 20s
Catherine Esposito Prescott
The Man with the Violin Case
Ruth Behar
Grabbed Villanelle
Catherine Esposito Prescott
Tenement Trick
Vanessa Garcia
Yellow American Woman
Marci Calabretta Cancio-Bello
Popponesset
Eileen Myles
That Autumn Sunday
Gerry LaFemina
Daughter, They’ll Use Even Your Own Gaze to Wound You
Beth Ann Fennelly
Bingo Night for Missing and Exploited Children
M. B. McLatchy
105 Degrees, South
Lucia Leao
Epistle from the Hospital for Harassment
Jenny Molberg
In Support of Violence
Christopher Soto
Creation Story
Mia Leonin
Angel Heart in Istanbul
Caitlin Grace McDonnell
Layover
Jericho Brown
When in Madagascar
Vicki Hendricks
The Opposite of Monsters
Laura Lee Huttenbach
The Worlds Words Make
Zoe Welch
In Guiding Dragon-Wasp Behavior of Deviant Tentacles Beneath the Underskirt of an Unsuspecting Queen
Catherine Moore
The Shape of Other People
Kelly Sundberg
II. INSTITUTIONS
Where to Bow to the Will of the Majority
Jen Karetnick
Women Have Been Trained
Marge Piercy
The Pallor of Survival
Laure-Anne Bosselaar
Like Judith Slaying Holofernes
Paul Tran
Me Too
Nicole Callihan
Girl at the Window
Rhonda J. Nelson
Redemption
Barbra Nightingale
Here Is My Pussy
Nicole Callihan
How We Lived
Emma Trelles
Sky
Michael Hettich
Questionnaire for Two Pussies
Denise Duhamel and Maureen Seaton
GB2G4
Michael Mackin O’Mara
Me Too—The Fall of Man
Cynthia Neely
A Brief History in Pink
Michael Mackin O’Mara
One in Four
David McLoghlin
The Peach Orchard
Rita Dove
Recipe for Resistance
Jen Karetnick
Killing
Miriam Bird Greenberg
Testimony
Denise Duhamel
Words That Know the Sun
Yaddyra Peralta
Body Politic
Bosch Jones
Speaker of the House
Sapphire
“It’s Just Words, Folks. It’s Just Words.”
Denise Duhamel
III. IMPOSTERS
Grope
Jessica Cuello
At Least I Didn’t Rape You
Caridad Moro
Cocoa Beach
Terry Godbey
Crank Caller
Nikki Moustaki
Sweet Sixteen
Terry Godbey
Summer Job, NY, circa 1997
Catherine Esposito Prescott
Puerto Rican Pussy
Ana Menéndez
Up for Grabs
Maggie Smith
Me Too Limerick with Six Drumbeats
Brenda Hillman
What She Told Me
Silvia Curbelo
Pink Underpants
Molly Peacock
El Americano in the Mirror
Richard Blanco
Threshold
Denise Duhamel and Julie Marie Wade
When a White Man Attempts to Steal Your Soul
Hari Ziyad
Said the Poet
Jenny Molberg
At International Judo Camp
Kyle Lopez
The Gift
Rita Maria Martinez
Date Grape
Freesia McKee
For a Minute There, I Thought We Could’ve Been Happy
Cathleen Chambless
IV. HOME
Too Old for That, Now
Caridad Moro
Blackout
Elisa Albo
At Any Age
Elisa Albo
A Root
Annie Finch
The Things Ma Says
Bosch Jones
The Lion Head Belt Buckle
Virgil Suarez
X Marks the Spot
Oliver Brantome
Those Sundays
Christopher Soto
Learning
Gail Carson Levine
Telling
Ivonne Lamazares
Psych Ward
Colleen Sutton
Because What We Do Does Not Die
Ellen Bass
Gender Bender
Jennifer Michael Hecht
In Memoriam, Ann
Debra Dean
Blindsided
Angela Bonavoglia
First Kiss
Lynne Barrett
Seven Times Seven
Trish MacEnulty
Afterword
Anita Hill
Biographies
Credits