Rape is a very serious and traumatizing event that no one should have to experience; unfortunately, as with all serious events, there comes a time when jokes are wormed into cultural humor. Rape is no exception. Patricia Lockwood’s poem “Rape Joke” gives a barbed commentary on the difficulties of experiencing rape as well as how rape is present in our society specifically through victim blaming, and forces readers to question if a rape joke is ever funny.
The relationship between the speaker and the boyfriend and rapist is established early on, with information sprinkled in between other bits of the story. The theme of the joke is also established in more than just the title: “The rape joke it wore a goatee. / Imagine the rape joke looking in the mirror, perfectly reflecting back itself, and grooming itself to look more like a rape joke. “Ahhhh,” it thinks. “Yes. A goatee.” / No offense.” The inclusion of No offense keeps readers within the mindset of a rape joke, as does the repetition of “the rape joke” at the start of many stanzas in the poem; the irony of pairing a rape with a joke is something that Lockwood hones in on. “Can rape jokes be funny at all, is the question. / Can any part of the rape joke be funny. The part where it ends—haha, just kidding!” forces readers to think about rape jokes, and the inherent irony of such a serious event being the subject of a joke. Rape is something that affects the individual who was violated in a long and serious way; the coping mechanisms and time that it takes to cope is something else that Lockwood includes in the poem.
While every rape scenario is different, oftentimes it takes a tremendous amount of time before individuals who are raped can properly speak out about what happened; Lockwood addresses this. “The rape joke is you went home like nothing happened, and laughed about it the next day and the day after that, and when you told people you laughed, and that was the rape joke.” This rings true for many people who have been raped, particularly by those who have been sexually abused or raped by their partner – this is case, the speaker was raped by her boyfriend, but she laughed it off. It is not clear why the speaker “laughed about it the next day and the day after that,” but it is clear that this could be considered victim blaming, which is another large issue in the poem.
There are many instances in the poem of victim blaming when the individual blames themselves for whatever has happened. The boyfriend had a history of violence, which is something that the speaker feels she should have picked up on, and possibly could have avoided being raped. “The rape joke is he once almost murdered a dude by throwing him through a plate-glass window. The next day he told you and he was trembling, which you took as evidence of his sensitivity. // How can a piece of knowledge be stupid? But of course, you were so stupid." As the poem progresses, the speaker becomes clearer and clearer about her own victim blaming. “The rape joke is that come on, you should have seen it coming. This rape joke is practically writing itself." The repeated instances of victim-blaming not only makes it relatable to the readers, but it also shows that victim-blaming is a common response and that it is a long, repeated, agonizing process. One of the turning points of the poem is after the rape has taken place when the speaker addresses her boyfriend about the rape. “The rape joke is that you asked why he did it. The rape joke is he said he didn’t know, like what else would a rape joke say? The rape joke said YOU were the one who was drunk, and the rape joke said you remembered it wrong, which made you laugh out loud for one long split-open second."
What does “Rape Joke” have to do with love and poetry? The relationship is a key component to the poem itself. The two had known each other for seven years, and that he was seven years older. and that the relationship that the two had was something that almost preceded the rape itself.
"The rape joke is that he was your father’s high-school student—your father taught World Religion. You helped him clean out his classroom at the end of the year, and he let you take home the most beat-up textbooks.
The rape joke is that he knew you when you were 12 years old. He once helped your family move two states over, and you drove from Cincinnati to St. Louis with him, all by yourselves, and he was kind to you, and you talked the whole way. He had chew in his mouth the entire time, and you told him he was disgusting and he laughed and spat the juice through his goatee into a Mountain Dew bottle.
The rape joke is that come on, you should have seen it coming. This rape joke is practically writing itself."
These lines not only show the evidence of victim-blaming, but they also show the relationship between the boyfriend and the speaker. They had known each other for a long time, and despite the rape, they had maintained their relationship – at least for a little while, since “the next day he gave you Pet Sounds. No really. Pet Sounds. He said he was sorry and then he gave you Pet Sounds. Come on, that’s a little bit funny." The complex relationship between the two is something to be examined in a course about love and poetry, particularly if the complexity is due to sexual assault, and how that changes a relationship about love.
Another reason “Rape Joke” could be considered a love poem is because the speaker must change in order to adjust to the event, and by telling this prolonged poetic rape joke, she is admitting to not only herself but her world that she has experienced this. Many people who are sexually assaulted or abused are silent about the event, be it due to embarrassment, shame, fear, and a number of other things. It took the speaker ten years before she could tell the rape joke. “The mattress felt a specific way, and your mouth felt a specific way open against it, as if you were speaking, but you know you were not. As if your mouth were open ten years into the future, reciting a poem called Rape Joke. / The rape joke is that time is different, becomes more horrible and more habitable, and accommodates your need to go deeper into it." The speaker struggled for years before she was at some form of peace with the rape, and with the victim blaming that is evident throughout the poem, you could conclude that the speaker has finally learned to accept the rape and no longer blame herself; this lack of blame is a form of self-love, as the speaker is finally able to share her testimony of the rape, ten years later through the form a poem. We can see the struggle that the speaker experienced as she attempted to cope with the rape. “The rape joke is that you were crazy for the next five years, and had to move cities, and had to move states, and whole days went down into the sinkhole of thinking about why it happened. Like you went to look at your backyard and suddenly it wasn’t there, and you were looking down into the center of the earth, which played the same red event perpetually.” The fact that the speaker is able to share her experience through a poem shows that she has been able to adjust to the betrayal, and accept that it has happened.
"The rape joke is that for the next five years all you did was write, and never about yourself, about anything else, about apples on the tree, about islands, dead poets and the worms that aerated them, and there was no warm body in what you wrote, it was elsewhere.
The rape joke is that this is finally artless. The rape joke is that you do not write artlessly.
The rape joke is if you write a poem called Rape Joke, you’re asking for it to become the only thing people remember about you."
The speaker has accepted the fact that she was raped, and that she is willing to be remembered as an author of a rape poem. She has learned to use her writing to help her cope with the rape, and can now speak of it through the form of poetry.
The issues that “Rape Joke” addresses are ones that need to be spoken of: victim blaming can prolong feelings of guilt, shame, and self-hatred. The poem itself is a celebration of not hating yourself because of an assault – the speaker is freed from the shame that she once felt because of the relationship with a rapist. Patricia Lockwood’s poem explores how one must cope with being sexually assaulted, with victim blaming, and with the bitter irony of rape jokes being part of culture.
