A Poem For My Third Assault

It happened again.
It happened again with fifteen people around and a bonfire blazing nearby.
It happened again.
It happened again and I was wearing jeans and a hoodie and boots.
It happened again in the dead of night in the dark in a field with a hand over my mouth.
It happened again.
It happened again and I was forced to the ground again and mud caked the back of my hoodie while I punched him in the face.
It happened again.
It happened again and I told him I didn’t want to go any farther and I was in the mud on my back telling him to stop.
It happened again.
It happened again and it’s my fault or so they will say and I feel like I can’t breathe because the shock is bubbling up in my throat choking me and the tears are pouring down like hot rain.
It happened again and it still didn’t matter that I told him to stop and repeated no dozens of time.
It happened again and you still told me that he was drunk so it didn’t count.
It happened again.
It happened again and I can feel myself becoming a shadow of myself again, retreating from reality again, avoiding the memory again.
It happened again.
It happened again. And it will happen again. And I will sit in the shower and cry and scrub myself until I’m raw and hate every inch of my body because it’s happened three times now and I don’t know what I’m doing to make it happen again and again and again.
It happened again.
And I survived again.
And I’ll wear this memory like a scar again. And everyone will laugh and say it’s my fault again because
It happened again.