was very kind.  When she regained
her wits, he said, It's all right, Kid,
I took care of you.

What a mess she was in.  Then he added,
you'll never forget me now.
And drove her home.

Only a man who is sick, she said
would do a thing like that.
It must be so.

No one who is not diseased could be
so insanely cruel.  He wants to give it
to someone else --

to justify himself.  But if I get a
venereal infection out of this
I won't be treated.

I refuse.  You'll find me dead in bed
first.  Why not?  That's
the way she spoke,

I wish I could shoot him.  How would
you like to know a murderer?
I may do it.

I'll know by the end of this week.
I wouldn't scream.  I bit him
several times

but he was too strong for me.
I can't yet understand it.  I don't 
faint so easily.

When I came to myself and realized
what had happened all I could do
was to curse

and call him every vile name I could
think of.  I was so glad 
to be taken home.

I suppose it's my mind -- the fear of
infection.  I'd rather a million times
have been got pregnant.

But it's the foulness of it can't
be cured.  And hatred, hatred of all men
 -- and disgust.

William Carlos Williams (1883-1963): The Raper from Passenack, from An Early Martyr and Other Poems, 1935; first published in Alcestis, January 1935, as "The Raper from Hackensack"

( "Literal description of the rape of a dear friend (a nurse) of mine, it [happened] after church. ... What are you going to do with an incident like this? I write poetry."  - WCW to John C. Thirlwall, c. late 1950s

Untitled: photo by Sotiris Lamprou, 31 January 2018

Untitled: photo by Sotiris Lamprou, 31 January 2018

Untitled: photo by Sotiris Lamprou, 31 January 2018