Central Park, June 11, 2000 Water Fight, Flight and Tears
by Sharon Esther Lampert
On June 11th, 2000, following New york City's Puerto Rican Day parade, over fifty women were taunted, sprayed with water, humiliated and molested in Central Park. The attacks occurred in broad daylight, with many witnesses. New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani
commented: "Policemen aren't everywhere...It's unrealistic to assume that police officers can be everywhere at very time, particularly when they are dealing with a parade."
(1)
From the five boroughs
of N.Y.C., sixty soulless
monsters came, not knowing
each other, they all found
each other all in agreement:
water all the women with ice
and bring them to tears.
(2)
Disarmed, each woman,
fifty in all, is disrobed, robbed,
sexually pawed and clawed.
Concentric circles form
around a sole woman; a first
circle of raging participants;
a second circle of cheering and
jeering spectators; and a third
circle of indifferent police;
4500 police on duty; 900
in the park; eight calls to 911.
(3)
Videotapes abound: Sexual Abuse
& Violence Against Women. Did it
or did it not happen in our park?
Men are everywhere but no real
men are anywhere to be found.
Too afraid, are men of the possible
knife wielding monsters attacking.
There are no heroes marching in this
Puerto Rican Day parade on women.
(4)
In childhood, my father gave
me an emergency whistle. As a
young adult, a canister of mace
hung from the belt loop of a pant
pocket or from my keychain;
who knows who lurks behind
unopened doors, and the upper
east side rapist is still at large and
nightly, he is on the prowl. Flyers
of his mug hang in every door way.
(5)
As an adult, in full bloom, it is
time, says this breast bearing woman
to bear arms. Nothing less than a gun will
protect my sacred soul from the soulless
monsters who have no fear of daylight
or police and no shame of ganging up
on women, children or the elderly.
This remedy places the victimhood
on the victimizers, as they are now
the victims of their victimization.
Justice will be served cold.
(6)
Attacked, even a dog would bite-
off the hand or chew-up the leg
of one of these soulless monsters
and remain on the right side of
the law. A cat would extend its
claws and engrave blood lit scars
into every face. Defenseless,
the women do not attack, unable
to poke out the eyes or kick in
the groins of any of the monsters.
(7)
And another concentric circle of soulless
politicians say that there are not enough
laws on the books to protect women from
domestic violence, stalkers, rapists and hate
crimes, at home, or on the street or in the
dark, back alley of a court room.
(8)
All Women, Please Hear My Cry!
Fight back, learn to pull the trigger
in front of the monster cocks that by
force, dare to squirt their poisonous
venom inside the wombs that gave
them life. And then justice will be
served cold, and the tears we weep will
taste bittersweet. We will visit their
graves, and weep again, ice cold tears .
