Today, in court 3,
a judge stole my son.
He knew nothing about me,
or our lives, and how far we’d come.
All he had were some pieces of paper,
written by a couple of women,
both named Claire.
About how I’d been beaten
and tried not to show it;
diminished with words;
and although I knew it,
I hadn’t the voice
to articulate pain;
easier to keep the peace,
to people-please, like a good woman should,
to let him bring me to my knees,
weighed down by gaudy gifts
and promises he’d never keep.
Somewhere in those years,
where I wasn’t free,
just a poor, peroxide, imitation of me;
high flying trophy-wife;
I watched myself glide by
as I stood,
a passive observer
of my own life.
And in those pages
All that was missing.
Distilled down
To a few brutal, sordid sentences
Of victim-blaming shame.
That I failed to protect
from a thing I could not see,
as if it was so easy-
it was bigger than me.
That I ignored the severity
and played down the rows;
encouraged my children
to accept his abuse;
they said
I had no insight;
I failed, they said.
And although he took my life,
my job, my home and self-belief,
it didn’t stop there,
because I had left –
I had to be punished
and hung out to dry;
and so, he enlisted the powers-that-be
to enable more beatings
Without touching me.
They blindly accepted his crocodile smile;
he bought them with Gucci-the watches and suits,
and the sweet stale scent of money.
He is an abuser, they stated clearly;
but you are the cause by failing to see
how bad he could be.
And complaints and letters
and all your whining
about the injustice,
well, it makes it so obvious-
you are an hysterical, chaotic mess.
And so our conclusion:
it’s all for the best
that he takes his son
away from you too
with full power
to do what he likes to you.
The same judge has history
of sound decisions.
A thirteen-year-old girl,
based on our information,
had asked to be raped
in that short skirt, at night.
The judge and the social workers
are always right.
So they said he’d be fair;
that he’d changed his ways;
that I needed to see that,
and be his best friend,
for the sake of the child
I would not see again.
But it is not just my voice
crying out in the dark;
hundreds of mothers, and fathers too;
broken hearts bleeding and crushed
in the dust;
trying to do our best
in this witch-hunting,
broken system;
failing our children,
and failing us.
This poem is written on behalf of all those who have experienced the inept chaos that is the family court system. It is a fictional account, but taken from factual sources. Something must be done; something needs to change. In some small way, the power of poetry is all I can contribute.
Virginia Betts 