for one, maybe two, years
after, i play words with friends
against one of the women that
sexually assaulted me

i was seventeen, and i
******* begged for them to stop,
please stop,
you’re hurting me

no one else at the wedding
after party heard me, music too
loud and champagne flowing too
freely

and the first person i told,
before she dropped me off
in front of the wrong house,
said, ‘i’m not calling you
a liar….but’

(her ******* husband
groped me, four years later,
and let me tell you, that’s some
irony i could have done without)

and the second person i told,
looked me in the eye and said
i was making the assault into
something it wasn’t, and i
needed to forgive those two women

i stopped telling people,
after that, choosing instead to
bleed out how wrong being touched
in that way made me feel

i don’t remember what i
was wearing, and i suppose
there’s a certain kindness in that,
my brain closing off that particular
memory so securely

i don’t remember what i
was wearing the first time,
either, but why would i, after
more than twenty years?

i lose count after the third time,
telling her to stop touching me
that way, looking around at other
patrons in the restaurant, that know
both of us, begging them to
say something, to help me,
but no one does

no one does
no one does
no one does

and this is a bandage, wrapped so
tight, that i do not pick at,
nor do i lift up the edge to
see what gangrenous ruin
lies beneath

and still, some nights i find myself
standing on the knife's-edge of
that dark abyss, haunted by the
ghost of something forced upon me

but i do not rage,
i do not drink until i am unable to stand,
unable to remember how all of
those hands felt on my skin,
i do not bleed over those ghosts

i do not bleed over those ghosts,
but sometimes the noose of that
trauma is so unforgiving i can’t breathe,
and i am seventeen again,
and i am twelve,
and i am five, maybe six

and these wounds, they are
open and screaming and bleeding
and so ******* hungry and i am
just so tired of being haunted

i am just so tired of being haunted

remake me as a fish,
this time,
let the knife calluses on
your fingers catch on the edges
of my iridescent scales as you
tenderly place them,
one by one

peel back my eyelids
to gently place shiny
river stones, polished smooth,
into empty eye sockets

and i do not fear the
knife with the curved end,
this time, as you open the
tender skin along my neck
on either side into fluttering gills

dunk your arms into the water
until it kisses the ends of your
worn shirtsleeves, and let me
loose to swim among the lily
pads, burrow into silty lake bed

and i’ll wait for you there,
letting the gentle lapping of the
lake against the rocky shore
lull me into sweeter dreams

maybe you’ll shed that second skin,
one of these days,
remake yourself in your own image,
just this once

and though the hook tugs,
buried in the meat of my inner cheek,
i know this is also a gift

and i won’t come out of the
water in a hail of droplets and
red, red, blood, thrashing and
choking on the fresh air

nay, this wild thing that lurks
behind my breastbone has been
worn away to make room for
how the sun looks arcing out across
the waters, how the knife calluses
on your fingers feel on my scales,
and how gentle you are with every part
of me, even those that still catch sometimes,
as you remove the hook from the
meat of my inner cheek and watch as
i slip back beneath the waves

alone in my apartment,
midday sun slanting through the
half-drawn blinds,
jolly roger fluttering gently in
one window, trans pride flag in
the other, i find myself feelin’
some kinda way

kneeling, though never in prayer,
i pull out packer, pouch, and
two different jockstraps

moving to stand out of view
from down on the street, i nestle
the packer into the pink jockstrap
and put my shorts back on

spend some time adjusting the
packer, wishing i had a full length
mirror, but sufficing with the little
vanity that lives by my coffee maker

in the open doorway between bedroom
and kitchen, i palm the length of
the packer through the front of my shorts,
wondering if the novelty of having
a ***** ever wears off for cis men

still feelin’ some kinda way,
i take out a black knee-length skirt
patterned in rainbows that so rarely
leaves the dresser drawer, and
slip it on

and i feel an all caps
kind of GOOD

and the grade A 100%,
genuine article,
bonafide,
GENDER EUPHORIA
i feel could power a small city

(and i slump down in my
ratty desk chair, knees loose and open,
palm myself through the front of the skirt,
imagine some faceless lover
running their hand up the inside
of my thigh and pulling aside the
jockstrap to get at the packer

picture them unraveling me like
divoting a thumbnail into the supple
skin of an orange, peeled in one long strip,
and taking me in like each segment,
juices running down their chin)

tell me true,
oh, love of mine,
what happens
after the fade to black?

from wide and life-sized
on the silver screen down
to a pinprick,
watch as those colors
slowly bleed out

and tell me what comes
next, after the cowboy
strolls off into that sunset,
painted in shades of red and orange

and what happens after
the pirate captain sails away
into that horizon, technicolor in
shades of empty *** bottles and
salt crusted into jagged long coat hems

does the old dog learn
new tricks, in this one?
do we take the rocks out
of our pockets?
do we ever love ourselves
back?

i don’t have the answers
this time, my hand is not
the one holding the pen

and i’ve slept through the
ending of this movie before,
or hid my face in your shoulder,
always grateful you’ll still let me

and i have no interest in
the man behind the curtain,
won’t look past that fade to black,
content in not knowing what
happens after the credits roll
for a little while longer

mouthful of cheap beer
gets caught on the
sudden lump in my throat,
bubbles burning all the way
up to my nose

i want to cry,
hot tears burning the backs
of my eyes

maybe throw my head back
and howl mournfully at that
big old moon, always so far away

and i’ve never been much
of a praying man,
but i’d still press my aching knees
into the soft dirt right outside that
lonely little cemetery chapel

and i won’t ask for succor,
have no plans to confess my sins,
just want to pretend for a spell
that i can find comfort in
something greater than myself

and maybe the cold metal
of the handle, that lovely wood grain,
will burn its way into the skin of
my palms when i try to step inside

and maybe i’ll let it,
just this one time

coyly, oh captain of mine,
you glance at me over the
soft curve of your shoulder,
and my mouth fills with saliva

i am a pirate, down to his
last dregs of ***

and i am a cowboy, dying of
a thirst in the desert that only
you can slake

and i am a bard, whose lute strings
have all been snapped by his own hand

to put it real bluntly here,
i am ******* starving

and there are so many ways,
to starve and be starved in turn

it is your touch that i yearn for,
tenderly on my cheek,
and ****** in the collar of my jacket

let’s curl around each other,
just this once,
share some body heat and a
six pack of cheap beers

and if i asked really nicely,
batted my eyelashes up at you
just so, would you let me
carry a piece of you with me?

let me sink my chipped and crooked
teeth in to that junction of shoulder
and throat, right above your collar bones

and we can pretend that your red,
red blood
on my teeth is a construction paper
valentine that i hand to you and
then shyly glance away

i ask you to run away with me,
say, ‘let’s get that boat sea-worthy,
hop trains and take buses,
go where the wind takes us
for a change’

i’d follow you to where the
ocean meets the sky,
if you let me

i’ve got so much love to give,
so be a little selfish just this once,
and let me pack a bag

i’ll be by your side,
or a few steps behind,
for as long as you’ll have me

this doesn’t have to be
some grand adventure, no
fairy tale ending where you
hold me so softly

just let me make you breakfast,
buy that coffee you like every
once in a while, and let’s watch the
early morning sunlight cast the room
in a golden hue together

and maybe you’ll say yes,
one day

and maybe you won’t,
and that’ll be okay, too