CitiWalks

Why does a girl who loves you hit you softly when you tease her?

Why does she tap you head with a book or slap you chest or arm when

you irritate her with your silliness?

Is it to discipline the unruly boy in men, to straighten up the naughty boy?

To make better men out of a fragmented, shattered you.

What does she imply with her tender, loving violence? Is she trying to provoke your masculinity?

By giving rise to the one deep inside her

Or does she want to feminize your blind, ignorant masculinity?

– the male pride that makes everything dull

Or lull your defenses, give rise to the femininity inside you

So that you don’t project your ugly power on her

The power that binds, blinds, exploits both the victim and the victor

And excites lust

The dust that covers the relationship mirror

In which a woman could have seen her reflection in a man

and the latter may have seen himself dissolving, vanishing

Vanishing into someone he thought he ‘owned’ (and in turn to whom he ‘belonged’)

Like the way he put his arm on her soft, bending waist when overcome with passion

And when it was silent and exhausted, found himself arm-in-arm with her

and being led instead

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