Right There, By Your Heart
I
i had a dream the other night that i was in a
bathroom, sitting on the toilet seat, i think it was
the one in florida, but it could have been anywhere.
it was a small bathroom. i was stretched over
this seat, and i think the lid was up. i was naked. there
was a wall right next to me, and i felt cramped,
like i couldn’t move. and then kurt was there, with me,
in the bathroom, naked, standing over me, screwing me.
i was sitting on a toilet seat and he was fucking me,
and in the entire dream i couldn’t get comfortable,
i felt very awkward, it felt like he was pressing
on my chest, i couldn’t breathe, it felt like there was a rock
in my stomach that would stay there forever, but
the entire time i didn’t complain.
II
have you ever had that feeling before, you
know, the one when someone is telling
you something you don’t want to hear, like
if someone was about to tell you that someone
died and you knew what they were going to say
and you still didn’t want to hear it, or if
someone did something to you you didn’t like,
like when you were little and the kids at the
bus stop shot pebbles and spit balls at you every
day because you were smart and you still had
to go to the bus stop every morning and just
try to ignore them? and when that happens
it feels like a medium sized rock just fell
into the bottom of your stomach, and you
don’t want to move because you’re afraid
that the rock will hurt the inside of your stomach
and so you just have to sit there and hope
the rock goes away? or else you get the feeling
in your chest, right between your lungs, it feels
like someone is pressing against the bone there,
right there by your heart, and you’ve got to
breathe, you’re not going to be able to take
that pressure, that force any longer?
III
it had already been a long day, sitting in the back
of someone else’s car for two and a half hours,
knowing that if elaine’s dad wasn’t such a slow driver
it would have taken less than two hours. I was trying to get
home so i could make it on time for the christmas party
but still have enough time to pack for my early
flight the next morning. airports have become a second
home to me. so i walked in through the melon doors
only three hours late, those melon doors that scream
of the perfect fifties home, of the perfect fifties family
that everyone believed we were. i walked through the
doors, sarah hugged me, and dad walked into the
hallway from the kitchen. wait a minute. he was
supposed to be on the other side of the country... well,
don’t ask questions, just act happy to see him. so i smiled
and laughed, until he hugged me. then the rock settled
in. he didn’t have to say a word. my mind started
going through the checklist: okay, what would have
brought him back here? who was the one who had died?
i said ’grandma’ before he did. i cried for fifteen
minutes, wiped the tears from my neck, my ears, and
i got ready for the party, trying not to move too quickly,
so not to disturb the rock.
IV
i got the mail, like i do any other day, and by then i had
almost forgotten about waiting for the test results. i
was just getting the mail, like normal. when i saw the
letter from the hospital that day in that little metal
box the pressure on my chest came rushing back like
wind when it rushes around the side of a building and
it takes you entirely by surprise and you lose your
breath trying to live through it. what if the test results
said i was sick, and i wasn’t going to get any better?
i had too many symptoms, the results had to show
something. something, damnit. maybe if i never
opened the letter, i’d never have to deal with
illness. maybe then i’d live forever. but i opened the
letter. it said the doctors still know nothing. i
just wanted to know what was wrong with
me. why i wasn’t perfect. the pressure on my
chest didn’t go away when i threw the envelope
on the ground by the mailbox. i walked upstairs.
V
i needed to talk to someone, so i threw my bathrobe on the
floor, pulled on some sweats, and walked over to his
apartment. steve was supposed to be coming home
from work soon, and i needed to talk to somebody,
i couldn’t keep everything bottled in. i must have looked
like an idiot standing on his stairs looking like i
was about to cry. i felt like an idiot there, too, not
knowing why the rock in my stomach wasn’t going away.
i wanted to ask him if he ever felt that rock, felt
that pressure, even if there didn’t seem to be a
reason for it at all except for maybe life itself, which
everyone was supposed to manage through
anyway, i mean, everyone has stress, what’s your
problem if you can’t take it? i wanted to figure it out,
whatever the hell it was that was bothering me, i
really wanted to. this panic was driving me crazy, and i
couldn’t even explain why i was panicked in the first
place. i didn’t tell him i wanted to light a candle and some
incense and just curl up in the corner of my bed,
holding one of my pillows, probably the black one,
and cry for a very long time. i sat there in his
apartment when he got home, but i didn’t speak. what
could i say? that the rock in my stomach wasn’t going
away?
VI
i don’t know how many times the idea of seeing him
went through my mind. at least once a week i’d imagine
a scene where he’d confront me, and i’d somehow
be able to fight him back, to show him that he didn’t
bother me any more, to show him that the rock wasn’t
there any more. to somehow be able to prove that
i wasn’t a victim any more. i was a survivor. that’s
what they call it now, you see, survivor, because
victim sounds too trying for someone who has been
raped. so i keep saying i’m over it but i keep imagining
mark all over again, not raping me, but following me
on the street, coming to my door with flowers, or
sending me a valentine. but once, when i saw him
walking out of a record store as i was walking in, the
rock fell so hard that i thought i was going to be sick
right there by the cash register, right there by those
metal things at the doorway that beep when you
try to take merchandise out of the store, you know
what those things are, i just can’t think of what
they’re called. but if i did that, then he’d know he was still
winning, to this day. how many years has it been? how
many years since he did that to me? how many years
since i’ve been wanting to fight him, since i’ve been
feeling that rock in my god-damned stomach?
i managed to hide my face from him in the store so he
didn’t see me as he walked out. when i saw he was
gone, i wondered why i still felt the pressure in my
chest. i thought the pressure was going to turn
my body inside-out. i reached for my heart, grabbed
at my shirt. maybe the pain was always there, right there,
by my heart, but i try not to think of it until i
go through times like those.
Copyright Janet Kuypers.
All rights reserved. No material
may be reprinted without express permission.
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to the studio recording from 
watch the complete video
(5:21)
See Kuypers’ full show video
See YouTube video 1/3/16 of Janet Kuypers reading part of verse 2 of her poem Right there, By Your Heart at the Austin open mic Kick Butt Poetry (Nikon CoolPix S7000)
