Dear invisible men,
Who tweet women endless threats of rape,
Who are you?
Are you married fathers of two?
Are you their work colleagues?
Are you teens crowded round a friend’s phone in a canteen or KFC?
Are you pausing between texting your first love,
To go on Twitter, become an egg,
And post fresh hate?
Where are you as you type this?
Is your girlfriend asleep in your arms,
As you peer over her shoulder at your phone?
How did this become your sport?
You’re not proud of what you do;
If you were, you would not care who knew.
This is strange:
You proudly announce pride in your prejudice
But your anonymity suggests your shame.
There is such an anger in you
That it cannot be clothed with your banter, your jokes.
I pity the mirror that has to reflect your misery,
Because it must see so much.
Because the women are everywhere now,
Aren’t they?
They weren’t just content in your beds, or in your lads’ magazines,
Or in your clubs,
Or even in the eyes and hearts of other men;
The women are top of your classrooms, in your boardrooms and your DJ booths,
Not needing you to improve.
Swiftly, they are sweeping you from every entitled stage,
And the only place you feel safe
Is in one-hundred and forty characters of rage.
I wonder, if you tweet abuse, you will ever pause
To think that, while you promise terror,
The greatest fear is yours.