Anna Verhoye-Final


In	
  Factis	
  Pax	
  
Volume	
  8	
  Number	
  1	
  (2014):	
  101-­‐103	
  
http://www.infactispax.org/journal	
  
	
   	
  

101	
  

	
  
Volume	
  8	
  Number	
  1	
  (2014):	
  101-­‐103	
  
http://www.infactispax.org/journal	
  	
  

 
 

Homology 
A Human Rights Poem 

 
Anna Verhoye 

 
 
 

Conceived from a homosocial bond, born into oppression, 

 I traversed the symbolic boundary leaving behind an identity that was not even 

my own. 

My story is not mine you see; it is yours.  

The illusion you hide behind with your revisionist history is but  

a fragmented delusion you WILL into being at your leisure;  

       the tapestry of my identity is woven together with  

 fraternal imperialistic thread you spun.  

No, I silently scream, I am not an agent of nationalism; I am the subject of patriarchy.   

Hybridity will not define me; I am not a blend, an object to be manipulated at 

your whim, I am me. 

 

 



In	
  Factis	
  Pax	
  
Volume	
  8	
  Number	
  1	
  (2014):	
  101-­‐103	
  
http://www.infactispax.org/journal	
  
	
   	
  

102	
  

Me. A child of that place; 

I come from a long trail of blood; but I tell you so do you. 

If I am not free though, nor are you. 

The diaspora renegotiates my identity without my consultation.   

Traumatic memories are fragmented morsels that live on the vapor of EVERY breath I 

take; they form the identity I know, the identity of me you fashioned so that you could be 

you;  

Yet, I am a paradox. My, yes, my lived experience is painfully inaccessible by 

day.  The only way I know I exist despite your attempts at eraser, are in reference to the 

grimaces on the faces of those who peer at my now deformed, disgraced and reimaged 

body.  By night, however, the hallucinations of my experience that you say do not exist, 

terrorize me, I am paralyzed.  I am, yet I am not. 

I can no longer associate my physical pain and mental anguish with reality; I, like 

the voyeur, leave my body to watch the horror the inanimate object below endures.  

Is this real? Only my bloodied, deformed body overtly evidences the intrusion yet 

I cannot access the proof you demand that I have been violated.   

A threat am I you claim.  A threat am I you claim.  Me, a threat to YOU? 

My battered body, bloodied face is a necessary consequence of your fear; because you 

are afraid, I, it appears, must be scary.   

The fantasy of my elimination informs your identity and fuels your imperialistic 

prowess; I am your prey.  I am object; I question, “Am I though?” 



In	
  Factis	
  Pax	
  
Volume	
  8	
  Number	
  1	
  (2014):	
  101-­‐103	
  
http://www.infactispax.org/journal	
  
	
   	
  

103	
  

The words I cannot, nay I say will not utter, you command from my lips.  Yet no 

beating, no threat, will compel me to succumb to the insanity of your pustuous infection 

that demands I prove who I am,  

That I prove, prove who you are not.  

 I am only foreigner so that you cannot be foreign. 

My story, sister irony says, may be revisionist with your words replacing my experience; 

but the horror that you struggle to reframe and to deny is not just my story, it is also 

yours.  Peer deeply into my wounded being and you will see yourself, bloodied and 

beaten; if I am not free, nor are you. 

Much to your chagrin, homologus are we.