What a hard, sad subject: Trethewey goes back to examine her memories of life with her mother and stepfather and the days leading up to her mother's murder. Trethewey is a poet, so her words are weighty, deliberate, and beautiful. The fear, dread, and torment is palpable and it was honestly hard for me to read this at the same time that Simone Biles, Naomi Osaka, and so many other female athletes are berated for making decisions for themselves from topics spanning how they dress to personal health, that women are not allowed to wear they would prefer in France, Netherlands, and the Middle East, that women are finally starting to be allowed to use the P word (preach) in some churches while hearing little more apology than "We upheld decisions in ignorance." All of it is about controlling women. We see examples of women being killed, literally losing their lives (not to mention livelihoods), for making rational decisions about what to wear, calling the police because they are in danger, and daring to say No or even look like they might want to say No.

There is a transcript of a conversation between Trethewey's mother and her stepfather that was recorded because the police needed evidence to arrest the stepfather. She is so patient, so calm, while he goes on and on about how she needs to make a decision between "giving him a chance" or "choosing death." I would have said that it's an extreme example of what women hear from their family members every day..... but actually it's a common example. I myself have heard this conversation on the bus more than once. 1 in 3 women suffer physical violence from intimate partners, so the chances are that you have encountered a woman today whose daily life is a terror movie.

In summary, it's upsetting.