The Secret Keeper: A parable for the victims of rape
There are secrets hidden in closets, bras, behind eyes; confidants that store these secrets in the back of their mind. These secrets are heavy. The weight of them ages the secret keeper. Burdened with the remembrance of rape, torture, assault, dehumanization, how can the secret keeper remain alive and healthy?
How does she bear the brunt for her sisters and still smile in the morning and make love to her man at night? How can she enjoy the fruits of her labor when she is tormented with thoughts of girls crying, screaming, fighting, retreating, defeated? It’s a daily struggle, pretending that we are humane when there is nothing human about us.
Men prey on the weak because they are taught from boyhood that only the strong will survive. They are told that anything they want they can have, no is nonexistent in their world, no is a word that only a coward would listen to. Young man, the world is yours for the taking, take.
Women be gentle. You are a flower, a rose, so delicate, so beautiful, easily broken. May your colors be brighter than the others so that you are picked first. Always in competition with one another, always at your best; ready. That boy grew into a man, he saw a flower that he wanted so he plucked her!
No gardening tools, no gentle scissors, cut from an angle to preserve life. He plucked her. Tore her from her root, like she was nothing with a smile of admiration on his face as he gazed at her beauty, but already she was dying. His lack of care, of thought, tore her from her life source.
But before she went, she confided in the secret keeper. She vividly explained the day she began to die. The day that her color started to turn into a bitter brown. The day when she no longer bathed in the sun and felt the gentle breeze sway her to the sounds of hummingbirds, when all was right in the world.
And the secret keeper wept. The secret keeper felt her heart breaking because she couldn’t repair the flower. No way to reattach it to the root, but what if we could replant you? What if you could find a new field and dig your own roots into the soil and spread your seed around? Shine brighter than before.
But what of the boy turned man? He was only doing what he was told that he could do, take. What do we do with him after he disposes of the flower after it has wilted and is no longer beautiful? He would surely want another. And then another, and then another because his heart could never be full.
He lives to take. She lives to be beautiful. That is the root of our dilemma. Who would not want something beautiful, who would not want to be beautiful? These are the things that we are taught to strive for, to live for, and so we do. We do it without realizing how ugly we become searching for beauty.
And in return that beautiful flower is plucked. That boy turned man took what wasn’t his and she began to die and he just thought that was the natural way, the order of things. It became normal and the secret keeper’s box overflowed. It overflowed while he had the whole world in his hands.
The woman is the world. The boy turned man wanted the world and he took it. So, we see the weather out of season, oceans piling up on land, plates of molten earth shifting, Africa cracking, forests filled with fires. Mother nature will save us. She swallows up the boy turned man, preserving the life of the secret keeper.
No, no justice in the court of law, no harm in the boy turned man taking without asking, but when you are the earth, when you are the only vessel for life, you hold more power than you think. Be a tornado. Be a hurricane. Be the flower that replanted itself and dug its own roots. Mother earth will deal with the boy turned man.
Nerra Muhammad
Parable dedicated to the victims of rape and those who carry their secrets.
I wrote this parable to describe how I have been feeling lately after my blog post on Jess Hilarious. After writing that blog, many woman have thanked me or shared their personal story with me, and it’s a weight that I do not carry lightly.
I am honored that so many women have been able to open up about their assault and confide in me, I just want to do my part to represent all of you well, and I have been conflicted with what to do about the weight that I feel from your stories.
So for a moment, I just want us to draw strength from one another, and if any of my readers would like anything from me in terms of writing or creating a safe space for victims of rape, please do not hesitate to reach out to me.
Please do not stop sharing, every time we share our stories, we are releasing some of that burden and sharing it with others.
As they say on GOT, “The lonewolf dies but the pack survives!”
Keep your head up ladies, don’t drop your crown.
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