Gabrielle Korn

A Novel

Yours for the Taking

—“A Woman Is Talking to Death” by Judy Grahn, 1974

Lindsay

Have you ever committed any indecent acts with women?

Yes, many. I am guilty of allowing suicidal women to die before my eyes or in my ears or under my hands because I thought I could do nothing, I am guilty of leaving a prostitute who held a knife to my friend’s throat because we would not sleep with her, we thought she was old and fat and ugly; I am guilty of not loving her who needed me; I regret all the women I have not slept with or comforted, who pulled themselves away from me for lack of something I had not the courage to fight for, for us, our life, our planet, our city, our meat and potatoes, our love. These are indecent acts, lacking courage, lacking a certain fire behind the eyes, which is the symbol, the raised fist, the sharing of resources, the resistance that tells death he will starve for lack of the fat of us, our extra. Yes I have committed acts of indecency with women and most of them were acts of omission. I regret them bitterly.

“I don’t need to read that book to know what’s in it,” her mom said. “I remember the era of the girlboss. I lived through it. I don’t care to see the propaganda it has evolved into. Aren’t kids interested in socialism anymore? What happened to intersectionality? We used to want to eat the rich. And you want to, what, be just like her?”

It was as though the general population was only capable of focusing on one major issue at a time, and the climate crisis took center stage.

The curse of being a woman with an opinion in public. It was devastating.

She realized that it wasn’t enough to assume the things you wanted would happen; you had to make them happen. The things that she wanted were hers for the taking, or not taking, but either way, action and choice were imperative. Passivity would never yield the intended results.

“No one prepares you for how dull it is to just survive,”

there was something to be said for being in a leadership position. The power it came with was like a salve for her busy mind.

She supposed she had incidentally arranged it that way. Her newfound self- awareness made everything feel worse. What was the point of self- actualization if you had no one to share that self with?

Equality is only scary if you have to give up power to attain it.

Yours for the Taking quotes

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