October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month (cont'd)

I have been down that road. I have seen what it can do.. I have also seen what can happen when someone else calls for help. Someone called for me. Now I live a happier life with my husband. He got help through the court system. Not all men can or will change.

I guess what I am saying in this article is help a woman. If you even suspect that she is being abused or she has told you, call the police. Call your local center for domestic violence. She need not know who called. Help her. Chances are she can't help herself. Chances are her children, her sons, see this and think it is normal, that this is the way a man treats a woman. Her daughters will see this and think this is how they should be
treated.

Also it isn't only women who are abused. There are men. Their numbers are smaller, but still it is not right in any case. Help someone today. Help yourself. There are people out there willing to help you hide, help you put your abuser behind bars, help you get YOU back.

Call the Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-SAFE (7233) Or visit their website at www.ndvh.org They have the facts, they have the specifics, and they are scary.

Anonymous


Today another woman died
and not on a foreign field
and not with a rifle strapped to her back,
and not with a large defense of tanks
rumbling and rolling behind her.
She died without CNN covering her war.
She died without talk of intelligent bombs
and strategic targets
The target was simply her face, her back
her pregnant belly.
The target was her precious flesh
that was once composed like music
in her mother's body and sung
in the anthem of birth.
The target was this life
that had lived its own dear wildness,
had been loved and not loved,
had danced and not danced.
A life like yours or mine
that had stumbled up
from a beginning
and had learned to walk
and had learned to read.
and had learned to sing.
Another woman died today.
not far from where you live;
Just there, next door where the tall light
falls across the pavement.
Just there, a few steps away
where you've often heard shouting,
Another woman died today.
She was the same girl
her mother used to kiss;
the same child you dreamed
beside in school.
The same baby her parents
walked in the night with
and listened and listened and listened
For her cries even while they slept.
And someone has confused his rage
with this woman's only life.
-Carol Geneya Kaplan

Anonymous