Performed by Val Cole

POEM:

My body isn’t a protest.
It’s a betrayal.

I’ve been trapped in here for years,
buried inside a harp seal,
wide-eyed with hakapiks overhead.
It was silent when I wanted to scream.
It froze when I wanted to fight.
It stayed when I should have fled.
My body isn’t a protest.

It’s a betrayal.
It’s a betrayal.

Even my body knows it,
marks its own cells as intruders,
attacks itself,
as if the outside world wasn’t enough,
it joins the conquest,
and forms an internal massacre.
Hand me the club.

I’ll do it myself.

Get to know the poet:

1) What is the theme of your poem?

The ways in which my body has betrayed me (through autoimmune disease) and how I have betrayed it by not protecting it.

2) What motivated you to write this poem?

I was asked to write a poem of my body as a protest and all I could think
was how my body never protested anything. Betrayal was the only sense I had in terms of my feelings towards my body. I imagined that it was equally as mad at me, hence attacking itself.

3) How long have you been writing poetry?

I have been writing poetry since the 4th grade, but I never shared a single
poem with anyone until I entered my MFA program. Sharing my innermost
feelings aloud was both powerful and nerve-wracking,

4) If you could have dinner with one person (dead or alive), who would that be?

My partner. I know this question intends for a more profound answer, but
he's the only person I want to sit across from. I'd choose him every time.

5) What influenced you to submit to have your poetry performed by a
professional actor?

I wanted to hear how someone else hears my words.

6) Do you write other works? scripts? Short Stories? Etc..?

I write memoir (which I don't publish) and social justice articles (which I
do)

7) What is your passion in life?

To be a voice for those whose voices aren't heard. I'm loud.