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After a while I would just look into his eyes as he beat me. Beyond the deep red and jagged texture of his skin and his spit splashing against my face and mouth. I looked, sometimes daringly and dangerously, to witness the rage behind his eyes, not searching for his humanity but my own. The punching, kicking, and throwing; the deafening volume of his screaming; and his hot spit spewing beyond his large teeth were not felt during those beatings. They would be felt later. I stopped looking away and faced him. Powerless and helpless, I think it was my only defense left. To observe and bear witness and remember.
Francis Novak, LCSW-R, is a psychoanalyst in private practice in NYC. He trained at the Manhattan Institute for Psychoanalysis and is a doctoral (DPsa) candidate at the Parkmore Institute. He is the Principal Clarinet of the Queer Urban Orchestra and is joining the faculty of the Institute for Expressive Analysis.