R: Poems

R Sep 2018

Each of us a little machine
Our gauges and whistles tooting their songs,
Toting labels like “fragile” so they
Know not to break the already broken.
We are oiled once daily for best performance and
They check our meters to know if we’re content.
We can solve any problem, please any of them,
Just by spitting linearly out our strings of happy speech.
If they’re confused they take a peek in our
Control panel and fix what is insecure.

It seems perfect to others but the everyday schedule
Will bore us fast as we please with ease not us but them,
The time left over allowing us to get further and furthest
Trapped in our own heads -

Gone to a place that can’t be fixed quite as easily, and this
Once confused them but they’ve learned to deal with it the only way they
Know how
To ignore and continue to see us as good as new, because
Our labels and gauges say we might be but
Little do they know
The best of us own two faces and
The robotic beeps and checks and okays are built by us to
Ignore what we fear also.

There would be a bright side,
But our imperfect human motherboards
Cannot Compute.

#depression

Dysphoria

R Apr 2018

Dysphoria

"You'll be fine,
It'll be okay,
It will get better,
birthname"

They say

If only they knew that sometimes a name is a shackle, holding us to what we've never been and keeping us there until we can admit to ourselves that we've never been fine, nothing's okay and it first gets worse

"Why are you so mad,
Nothing seems to be wrong,
Why aren't you happy,
girl"

They say

If only they knew that sometimes feelings are subtle masks, painted onto our faces with the blood we drew yesterday to hide what we need to say to escape the viscous cycle of hate and tears and figurative death, and emotions are betrayals of what we need to be

"Everything would be fine,
They'd all be cool with it,
Why can't you just come out"

They say
(skipping
my name as the smallest act of a
hand in the darkness)

If only they knew that coming out is something that never goes fine, a delicate balance of worse and worst that makes our hearts beat so fast that cool is no longer a phrase but a temperature we need to reach in order to play our everlasting game of pretend

and

a name is a shackle, holding us to what we've never been and keeping us there until we can admit to ourselves that we've never been fine, nothing's okay and it first gets worse and even when it's not said we can hear it in the air, lingering on their lips like the slurs that we always expect to hear but haven't yet because to slur they need a target, an out, and coming out is something that never goes fine, a delicate balance of worse and worst that makes our hearts beat so fast that cool is no longer a phrase but a temperature we need to reach while the world spins faster and hotter and turning on the fan at night just keeps us up, dreading the dawn where we must once again play our game of pretend like everyone's born how they'll be for the rest of their lives and no one is different from the norm while still being okay

and

we go to Society everyday with a smile on our faces to say

"You'll be fine,
It'll be okay,
It will get better,
birthname;
Why are you so mad,
Nothing seems to be wrong,
Why aren't you happy,
birthsex"

because emotions are like coming out delicate scales of worst and worser and when we can't feel them we get enough cool relief to realize That This
Dysphoria
Is
Crushing
And
We
Can't
Get
Okay

Save me

#dysphoria #help #trans #alone #scared

Fatal

R May 2018

Fatal

Hello little boy, grass-stained knees.
You'll grow up to be a queen,
Called only by the highest gendered words.

Hello little girl, boas and tea parties.
You'll grow up to be a ranger,
Warned not to act like a female.

Are you there, little boy?
Is it still you under the sorrow
Of looking back and seeing a stranger?

Are you there, little girl?
Can you still hear me
Under your cries for help?

Please don't despair.

No, I can't promise that
One day, you'll be you again.

Please don't go.

No, I can't tell you how
Many years you have left like this.

Goodbye little boy, cut up arms.

Goodbye little girl, scissors and band-aids.

You grew up to be a someone,
But you didn't know who.

Growing up is fatal.

#trans

Fatal

R Jul 2019

Fatal

Hello little boy, grass-stained knees.
You'll grow up to be a queen,
Called only by the highest gendered words.

Hello little girl, boas and tea parties.
You'll grow up to be a ranger,
Warned not to act like a female.

Are you there, little boy?
Is it still you under the sorrow
Of looking back and seeing a stranger?

Are you there, little girl?
Can you still hear me
Under your cries for help?

Please don't despair.

No, I can't promise that
One day, you'll be you again.

Please don't go.

No, I can't tell you how
Many years you have left like this.

Goodbye little boy, cut up arms.

Goodbye little girl scissors and band-aids.

You grew up to be a someone,
But you didn't know who.

Growing up is fatal.

Hope

R Jul 2019

Hope

Let me melt into these walls,
And let me lie within the floorboards.
I am nothing but a whisper,
Answering to stranger's names
And existing in the margins of a
Society that rewards not the talented
But the average.

I don't take pride in calling "here"
During attendance, when my birth certificate,
Passport, and legal identity feel
Like further chips in the marble of my
Sanity.

If I were to be gifted a genie,
I would ask him not for riches
But for the basic truths 99% have,
Those who can answer a roll call with a smile
And feel safe in their state's public bathrooms.

In my dreams I am not famous or powerful
But rather the very person you would not notice
If he walked down a street
Or into a bathroom or locker room.
You would not call him slurs and you
Would not look at him twice, your brow furrowed in
Embarrassing confusion.

Until the day I look in the mirror and
Grin back I lie in wait,
Here where no one has to think twice.
I sit off in the corner unnoticeable
For fear of being wrongly categorized.

Many americans preach true freedom but I wishfully
Hear a different song ahead,
One where I no longer am in fear of
Our legislation and my classmates and one
Where I can stand,
And breathe.

Proud

R Jun 2018

Proud

They tell me to be proud,
but little do they know that Pride is a deadly sin and even deadlier if I walk through the wrong alleyway.

They tell me to be confident,
but little to they know that hands-in-my-pockets-hunched-over has hid me my whole life.

They tell me to be loud,
but little do they know that disappearing quietly has kept me alive all these years.

They tell me to speak up,
But little do they know that masking who I am has allowed me to move in this world
As If I Am Free.

They tell me to be proud but pride is confidence and confidence is being loud and being loud is speaking up and speaking up

is

Dangerous? Dangerous.

They tell me it's okay,
they'll be fine,
But how could they know? They haven't
faced the fear of knowing the unlimited know -

- Secrets spilled as blood over middle school halls -

They tell me to be proud.

They tell me to be proud, as if
confirming the masses can fix all that I've broken -

-Silent shards over ***** linoleum -

They tell me to be proud.

They tell me to be proud and I nod,
breaking glass and spilling blood and
maybe one day I will.

Maybe one day I'll speak up
loud and confident,
the terror of facing them left behind, my
shining clean face proud.

But until then,
They tell me to be proud.
They say and tell and demand me to be proud.
They tell me to be proud.

Dangerous? Dangerous.
Deadly? Deadly.
Shards.
Sins.

Pride.

Shoutout to Those People Who Make Me Write This Poem. You know who you are.

#pride #trans #outed #confident #loud #slam #secrets #ftm

Remember Love

R Mar 2018

Remember Love

“It’s just a disease”
They tell me.
But really, it is more than that.
Taking, taking, it just takes what you love
And leaves a big
E M P T Y
Hole.

“It’s just one person”
They tell me
But really, it is more than that.
Taking, taking, it just takes who you love
And leaves a big
E M P T Y
Hole.

“We can still remember him”
They tell me.
But really, how can you?
When he didn’t remember you?

It’s not just a disease.
It’s not just one person.
You may not ever remember him,
How he was
Before.

Before,
He offered us popsicles,
And told us stories
Like the one with the toll bridge.

Before,
He knew my dad
And not just as a “Gastonia boy”.

Before,
He gave us hugs
And you can’t hug someone
You don’t recognize.
You can’t love someone
You don’t recognize.

And yet he does.

Tribute to my great-grandfather. He died of Alzheimer's when I was in the fourth grade. I still think about him a lot.

#alzheimers #love #remember #forget #forgotten

Rock

R Mar 2018

Rock

The extra,
Understudy,
Alternate.

I’m the topics not covered in health class,
The friend you only talk to once you’ve run out of options.
The opener for Duran Duran,
The new moon not seen,
The sexuality deemed “fake”,
That feeling you know but can’t name,
The secret you’re forced to keep hidden,
The rock in a sea of people terrified of change.

But Change is what you do,
And leave me,
Your sickbed shirts,
In a crate.
Me,
Your wooden pipe,
In the trash can.

You terrorist.
You Ziggy Stardust,
Landing on this rocky planet
Only long enough to make a mark,
And then changing,
Leaving me counting on the 3 hands I used to carry your baggage,
The number of things I did wrong.

If you were human,
I’d be a dog.
You’re the ocean.
I’m rock.
I’m the extra,
Understudy,
Alternate,
Unspeakable,
Acquaintance,
Lone wolf,
Phased rock,
Fake,
Forgotten,
Desperate,
Unchangeable,
Other.

“But that’s okay.
You’ll change.
It’s just a phase”

Ziggy Stardust - "making love with his ego" - Ziggy Stardust from the album Ziggy Stardust and the spiders from mars
Duran Duran/lone wolf - Hungry like a wolf

#classicrock #firstpoem #hammy #queer #society #free #verse #phase #rock

Say Something

R Jun 2018

Say Something

Constantly fighting.
Sometimes it’s easier just to give in.
To stay silent, save your voice, don’t
Shout into the coming gales.

Running against the wind,
We all get pushed back sometimes,
Doubting whether it would do any good.
We keep quiet, terrified of speaking up.

But child.
Telling truths is the light switch,
The calm after a storm.

Follow your heart. Breathe in, breathe out.
Make your own wind.

Shout it from mountaintops,
Scream it in storms.
Whisper it in the cool dark of the night.

It’s okay. I am too.

I’m trans. I’m bi.

#trans #bi #gay #say #comingout

Scarecrows

R Nov 2018

Scarecrows

We are not scarecrows.

We know this, and yet
we can be mistaken for them, on
dark nights when legal actions ****.

We are not scarecrows, because
Scarecrows are used to scare crows and we
are used to scare someone - ourselves - into staying silent.

We are Not scarecrows, but someone passing by would see
both in an equal light, not quite human but trying.

We are not scarecrows, because at least we can
Vote where scarecrows only stand but Scarecrows are not told they
Can't serve their country or use the correct locker room.

We are not scarecrows because scarecrows can't hear
Slurs and whispers behind them like caws of a bird who only needs to survive.

We are not scarecrows but maybe we are,
Reduced to sacks of lifelessness that may as well be hay because it's a lot harder to find a story with me in it then a story with scarecrows.

We don't want to be scarecrows.

#trans

Sometimes

R Mar 2018

Sometimes

Sometimes
Your heart beats
Fastest
When becoming
Who you
need to be.

This is about coming out

#comingout #bi #trans #queer #nervous

Stars

R Mar 2018

Stars

The stars in the sky
At midnight seem to be
forever
(Unlike
Us)

Tell me

R Sep 2018

Tell me

Tell me I’m crazy
Tell me the truth
Tell me I’m hell bent on approval
I slather on pride as a sticky sunscreen to try and hide the scars

Tell me I’m crazy
Tell me I stay up at night terrified
I have everything to be afraid of
Tell me I’m crazy.

I need you to tell me I’m crazy
To tell me the truth
I hide in the shadows and can’t be dragged out
Tell me I’m crazy

Tell me I’m alone
That I’m a singular ink blot in perfect cursive because
Life would be so much easier if I had an excuse for all this
Tell me I’m crazy.

Tell me it’s okay
Because at night when I lie awake
Scared of shooters and secrets and fire and friends
I need to know I have a future
Tell me everything

Tell me everything because
I’m tired of being cast to the side, the footnote of an essay, tell me everything
Because I need to know

Tell me I’m loved
Because when I sit under my desk and watch 10 become 12 in the reflection of the blade I use so often
I need to know

Tell me this is a phase
That tomorrow I can wake up
And smile and make my life
Happy and be normal
Tell me this is a phase

Tell me this is normal
That everyone goes through this
Tell me I’m alone
That I have a reason for this all
Tell me it goes away with time
That I have a future worth living
Tell me this is a phase
That I can be normal soon
Tell me everything
That you know how I feel
Tell me I’m loved
That you feel the same way
Tell me I’m crazy
Tell me that it’s okay.
Tell me the truth.

Because in the shadows I have everything to be afraid of.

Alone?

#trans #scared #alone #afraid

Think Before You Speak

R Mar 2018

Think Before You Speak

“Think before you speak”
You tell your impatient 5-year-old,
Who’s fighting to find her place.

“Think before you speak”
You tell your mad scientist 8-year-old,
Who’s fighting to make her own place.

“Think before you speak”
You don’t have to tell your sad 12-year-old,
Who’s place seems as mixed up and hidden from reality as hope.

“Think before you speak”
You might tell your 15-year-old on her way to a protest,
Who’s place in this world is to fight.

Or

“Think before you speak”
You might scold your 15-year-old on trial for violent protests,
Who thought her place in this world was to change everything.

Or

“Think before you speak”
You might croak out at your 15-year-old’s funeral,
Who thought it was too late to find a place,
Too late to be found.

Sorry if this is sad, but it's how I feel.

#sad #think #empty #protest #place

— The End —