He sat in dewy grass
Writing a pastoral dialog.
“And death is also here,” mused he.
“All art depends on gravity.”
He neatly ordered his pages.

She wove lilacs in her hair,
Standing on moss in the damp morning air.

He considered that God might be in all things.
Was he blaspheming by crushing the grass?
But of course Bentham’s calculus obviates sin.
He thoughtfully scratched his chin.

She approached him from behind,
Dismayed by the clutch of wildflowers
Someone had wrenched out by the roots and thrown away,
Yet suffused in the absolute peace of that day.

She touched his arm—a summons.
What was that sensation?
He was left without rational explanation.

i know what it’s like
trust me on this one
to be betrayed by your own mind
a handful of pills
morning and then after breakfast
and then after dinner
the dreaded 500 calories needed to
make the magic work
like how am i gonna get skinny
if i eat like this

i’ve been betrayed by
my own hand
when the right took the razor
store bought a dollar a dozen
or filched away in my pocket
but that was only one time
to the left arm
and i cried that first time
but only because of how much it bled
and boy did it bleed

i betrayed myself once
for four years
with every cut and scrape
and lapse and relapse
it never ends
it never ends
until it does
and you don’t know what to do
with yourself
but it does not make you weak

and then i gave
myself up to the wolves
with a handful of pills
choked down with a bubbly water
because i  couldn’t take them with water
to save my life
and i went to sleep that night
fully prepared
not to wake up in the morning
like that old man in the nursery rhyme

i became a master
of faking a smile
but sometimes i over share
and accidentally give people
a glimpse of the shattered pieces
beneath my calm facade
and they either look at me with pity
or back away slowly
i don’t wanna be pitied
but some of them stay

and i understand what
you are going through
because i have been there
in that same hell
since i was twelve
since that first cut
since that first overdose
since that first therapist
since that first hospital visit
but we just need to keep going

we’re alright we’re alright
not because we really are
but because people need us to be
and i am right there beside you
i will hold your hand through the
constant struggle against our own minds
because you will not lose this battle
i understand
i get it
i am here for you

the kids can’t be
alright until people listen to us
take us seriously ******
because this is not a game
nobody willingly picks up the board
they try to throw down the pieces
but they are stuck to our hands
and they won’t come off
this is something you can’t shake off
but we’re alright

the tears they stick to my face
burning like salt in a fresh cut
though mine were never very deep
they were always fresh and there
and there was blood all over my clothes
mainly my long sleeves and sweatshirts
i remember the first time i bled through a shirt
at school and the butter knives that i hoarded
like i was gonna fight off my demons with little
ridged pieces of plastic
but ****** they kept me company
when mother dearest was either too drunk or ******
to realize my first cut
i mean come on lady it bled like a stuck pig
i cut really close to the vein that time
sometimes i wish i had had the guts to
go deep enough that first time
and i never would have had to deal with
four years of self-destruction
maybe if my mom had pressed me for the truth
but it’s more my fault than hers
though for once
that is not the reason why i am crying

i am not enough of a boy
but i’m too much of a boy to be a girl
and i’m too much of a girl to be a boy
but ****** who are you to label me
you haven’t asked me how this feels
you only cared right after i tried to **** myself
and only then i’m convinced you only asked because
my little sister was in the next room
and the doctor
his name rhymed with cranberry
and i hated him right away
he told my my being transgender
was just a diversion tactic
like buddy dood sir mister ******* listen to me
i am so ******* open about my mental illness
it’s all i talk about
i am literally a broken ******* record
i am loud and out and proud about everything that
is going on with me
both inside and outside
and if i wanted to create a “diversion”
i would have just slit my throat
because then i would have made my mother happy
by not being able to correct her when she continued
to call me her sweet little precious little
baby girl

you say i can’t be a boy
because of the clothes i wear
and the little tics i have
how i do jazz hands when i’m excited or happy
and this is a rare emotion
you should be proud that i am an emotional guy
instead of just a rock
a pillar of broken pieces
and yelling and grabbing and scars
because you and daddy dearest
you taught me that i should keep everything
inside of me
because you do not understand what is happening
to your little girl
and neither do i
but i do understand enough to know that
since i was seven
i was just a kid
i have known i was different
and it was okay for other people to be a lesbian
to be gay or bisexual or god forbid transgender
but i couldn’t do anything more exciting than wear
mismatched socks and combat boots to school
you didn’t bother to educate me on those things
and that’s why when i found out what transgender meant
through tumblr might i add
i finally knew that i wasn’t some broken toy
i’m not a freak
i am not a freak
but you make me feel like a freak

but i can’t be a girl either
because every time someone misgenders me
or calls me she or her or you introduce me
as your ******* daughter
it makes me want to rip out my insides
to show you that they have the word
boy painted on them
in blue and dripping paint
my insides are male
but i can’t be a boy
no i can’t
because i didn’t show any signs of it
growing up
i came out too late for mommy dearest to
believe or accept me
i can’t be a boy because i have a ******* ******
well you accept famous transgender people
and i am sorry that i don’t have the money to transition
i would if i could
but i’m pretty sure i’ll be dead before then anyway

i scared the dog with my sobbing and yelling
he’s still hiding in the bedroom upstairs
and i should be doing my summer school
but you have never been supportive of my schooling
so i really don’t see the ******* point
and sometimes the voices sound like you
they tell me what a disappointment i am
how i am so wrong
how you don’t love me
how you can’t love me
how i am going to hell
i am afraid to go to sleep at night
because all i do is dream about being dead
they tell me in your voice
that you would rather have me dead and a girl
than alive and a boy
and i am afraid that that is how you
really feel about me
like sorry i was ever born

i am not a girl
but you say i can’t be a boy
then i say i am not real
you are grieving a ghost
you say you want your little girl back
maybe you should have loved her more
both of you
this is for both of you
*******
you ruined the best thing either of you
has ever and will ever have
but this idea
this radical idea
that i may actually know better than either
of you what i was born to be
this is what keeps me going
late at night when i want to start
stock-piling my trazodone
maybe this time will be the charm
and then you can put her name on
my headstone and make me wear
the prettiest dress that i never would
ever wear while alive
but a corpse can’t talk
so what does it matter
i can be your little girl again
even if she is just a body

but **** that
i am going to keep on living
and yes
lopping off my ******* will solve
a lot of my problems
i am going to start t *******
even if you disown me
i have created my own little family
we are the lost boys and girls
the demon left in the presence
of your non acceptance
and i will be who i was always meant to be
a boy
my name is priestly
i am a boy
and even if you don’t accept or believe me
and that really ******* hurts
but i am good at hiding things
i believe and accept myself enough
for the both of us
and i have friends that
believe and accept me too
i am going to keep on living
because as her i was just surviving
but now finally after so many
long and hard and trying years
i am glad to be alive
i am living
as who i was meant to be
and i literally cannot believe that you
had the guts
to use the ******* gender binary on me
you ******* *** hag
and stereotype me into your little box
of blue for boys
and pink for girls

well maybe i like purple better

So I am a mutt
And this is my poem about having split identities
And not knowing who the **** I am
I am Chinese and Irish
Got them green eyes, but eat rice with every dish
Have the freckles, but my first language wasn't English

Back in high school, people called me white washed
But then,
Pointed and called me that Asian
People would sneer, "You aren't even real Chinese"
But there are so many things you all don't see
Like how my Tiger mom screams at home
About getting straight As
Till her shrills leave me frozen to the bone
And when I had a boyfriend she didn't approve of
She yanked my hair
And I cried it wasn't fair
She yelled, "oh I'll give the boys something to stare"
I watched as she cut all of it off
Strand by strand
Like a strong gust of wind blowing all the leaves off the branches till it was bare in winter
The following day at school, my excuse was I needed a new look, so this was her
And meals I don't even know how to translate into English are my comfort food
But I can down some fries and burgers when I'm with the dudes

I embrace both sides of what I am
But people categorize me into one, *******
With my Chinese family
They straight up tell you
You too skinny, too fat, so silly
They say my accent has gotten worse
The anger builds up of embarrassment and hurt
The race makes my face so red, it's like my head will soon burst
There's this underlying feeling of shame, that's the worst
Which side of me do I need to prioritize first?
I'm drowning between the ocean of two separate cultures, I'm submersed
English is the language I think in and I curse
There's so much more I can't even tell you within this verse

Oh the irony doesn't end there
My driving stereotypes are quite the scare
Cause I'm Chinese, automatically I **** at driving
But mixed with Irish, I'm also road raging
It's probably the worst combination
Of a stereotype from two different nations
Ha oh there's more
The drinking stereotype that's for sure
Irish side could down the whiskey much too quickly
But the Chinese typically are easily tipsy
This mix is kind of risky
One turns so incredibly red
And the other can get so drunk, you'd see two heads

I feel I am constantly at war
One side always wanting more

For some reason I can't stop pretending that I am alright.
I can't break the illusion that I am fine.
I think I am just scared that when I stop pretending it might never go away.
I am afraid it will get even more real.
But how then can I make you see that I am not okay when I don't dare to admitt.
I need help but don't dare to ask for it.
Why am I so scared of showing how I feel?
I wish I knew...

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..
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When the inflated crunching sky turns into the black hole, one by one the expected stars slowly falling on the horizon, sudden deep dark clouds cover the silky face of moon, or the earth takes the full moon.

Long, long shadows darken the meadows, southern wind can’t open your closed window at all, standing along on the curve of a road, a sigh to fly in the wind, roaming heart finding a home.

See the mystic form of the known objects, distant standing old banyan tree suppose to feel a lonely friend of mine, a friend of rootless time, when silly, bogus thoughts engulfed me, want to break up but change does not cry out.

Melancholy beauty in the dark, floating with the imagine gulls in the sky, draw the red sun on the canvas of dark sky within the wings of dream, again see you are playing with the seven colors across my unfinished sky.
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@Musfiq us shaleheen