This summer Peregrine accepted my poem “How I will explain the rape to my daughter” for publication. This fall they printed Issue XXXIII without sending proofs for contributors to look over. They made two errors in the formatting of my poem, interrupting the consistency and distracting from the power of the last line. I was heartbroken and embarrassed to share the piece, but not sharing wasn’t an option. It means so much to have the poem out in the world where other survivors of trauma can read it. I want to share the properly formatted version here:

The mistakes made by the editors of Peregrine pressed me to closely examine and consider that last line of the poem. Before submitting the poem in January of 2019, I had made a quick but significant edit to the last line. The intention was to make the poem more emotionally accessible, but in retrospect, I think I did myself a disservice. This is the poem with the original and perhaps more honest last line:

The tortuous and confusing truth of the matter is that in my years of healing, I never tried to unlearn my love for the man who hurt me. It’s not an easy thing to admit, even to myself. But it’s much more complex than any of that. So I want to have this version out in the world too, for those of you that might understand.