Or: On How To Let Go

1. The first time your grandmother cries
and says you died along with your grandfather,
smile.
You never liked her much anyways,
so being dead to her- while not ideal-
isn't the worst way to go.
2. Remember that time you went shopping
for your first pair of cargo shorts
and the same grandmother was RIGHT QUICK to point out
to the cashier that you are very much a girl
all soft curves and short limbs
and regrets and quiet voices
and you gotta try not to smack her.
3. Remember when a Wal Mart worker said,
"Good morning, Sir"
and again, that same grandmother
was right quick to point out
that I was very much a lady,
that I was petite and passive
and everything she wanted me to be
4. Just... Hide it.
Because while they may say they're okay with it
you still see the sideways glances
and the glares, and the stares,
and the cries of, "How the hell do you expect to be a boy
if you're wearing that skirt!"
5. Try your best to explain it to every person
that you'll ever bring home
to meet this family.
Say... "Sometimes, I kind of feel
a little bit like a boy."
Underplay it.
Severely.
Don't tell them that some days
you wake up crying and clutching at your chest
wishing it was gone
that some days death sounds more preferable
than living in this body
Don't tell them that it's way deeper
than "sometimes" and "kind of"
that it's a constant nagging fear
6. Sit down at Christmas dinners in a dress.
Be aware that you're only making things
harder on yourself.
6. Sit down at Christmas dinners in a suit and tie.
Be aware that you're only making things
harder on yourself.
7. Their insistence that they can't even try
to call you their nephew,
or their grandson,
cause it would be too ******* them
8. My transition is too ******* them
5. I wake up some mornings
willing to do anything I can to switch bodies
with my best friend: a trans woman
who hates her body as much as I hate mine
that's something we have in common.
I'd give anything to have her body,
she'd give anything to have mine
9. Recognise that your family
isn't gonna understand.
10. Deal with it the only way you know how:
every self-destructive tendency
you've clung to all these years
quickly becoming your other best friends
6. Realise that feeling this way
is making things harder on you.
11. Realise that it's okay
to break up with your regrets
and though they'll cling to your shirt
and drop to their knees
and beg beg beg beg for you back
Do not take them back.
12. Realise that you are so much more.
That you... Are valid,
despite everyone who calls you
the name of a person
you don't even recognise anymore
realise that you are valid
despite everyone who says you're not
cause when you think you're not,
when you're pressing yourself into mattresses
and obsessively working out
and holding back tears looking at all the clothes
you wish you could look good in,
that's.... well, that's when you need it most.
0. Let go of the fact that your family
calls you the name of a person you don't recognise anymore
because one day, you're gonna show up for Christmas dinner
and they're not gonna recognise you.
And that's one of the most comforting feelings
in the world.

There are galaxies in my throat
all named after you.

Looking up at the stars,
i remember how long ago
I tried to hide myself inside of you.
because darling,
you are a galaxy
full of blazing stars
and circling planets
and vastness,
you are infinite
and you always have been.
I remember how
we walked outside my house at night,
you tapped your feet against the pavement
and i gazed at the sky,
and at you,
longingly,
i watched you dance.
i've been wishing on the same star for years
but now, all i see
is the dullness of a cloudy sky
that you created
out of the dust of crushed pills.
You are beautiful.
your tired eyes and yellowed teeth
are not.
You are gorgeous,
but the scars and protruding bones
are not.
You searched for yourself
in glass bottles and burning desire
to wash yourself away.
you are a masterpiece,
your long flowing hair
your hips
your lips curled into a smile,
i was madly in love with you
but I have no idea who you are anymore.
you are worth everything,
but the alcohol is not.
the drugs are not.
Dying is not worth anything.

I miss her.
I miss how we used to be.
We sat on my bed
and wrote on my wall,
"We're 13.
People treat us like kids,
kids have fun.
When did we start making life
so ******* complicated?
We need to have fun again."
We need to have fun again.
We needed to have fun
so she took a bottle to her lips
and started crushing pills.
We needed to have fun,
but we took keys and razors to our wrists
under desks, in bathrooms, and under covers
to deal with the fights, the lies,
the whole world being against us.
(A tradition i recently continued
after 4 years
by taking a razor to my upper arm in
our school's art gallery.)
Those Nights that we spent together,
those nights kept me alive...
until they didn't.
Until I lost her.
Until she became nothing
but the smoke
of a burnt out candle
remnants of the blazing fire that she once was,
whispering,
"you're a liar...
you said you'd get better."
I sit back and see her wasting away
and i hate myself for not trying harder
to save her.
We needed to have fun
but as I watched her transform
from a girl to a ghost,
all gangly limbs and rotting teeth
and scars and nosebleeds
and missing conversations
and empty words,
I wonder what kind of fun
she could possibly be having.
I used to know her better than I knew myself
but as i watch her go from a sister
to a stranger,
I realise i barely know her name now.
i miss her.
I hope she knows this isn't what i meant
when i said,
"We need to have fun."

he's 24 years old.
he's 24, he's 24, he's 24
and you were 27
and i'm 17
and what the **** is age anymore.
casual flirting and joking
back and forth
turned into his hand twisting in my hair
and him pinning my wrists above my head
and his breath in my ear
and suddenly I can't breathe
because he feels like you
he feels so **** much like you that I can't think
because I have a boyfriend who doesn't know
because he's 24
and his arm feels like yours as I grab at it
and I moan and I giggle
and I almost whisper your name
because he and i
never even kissed,
no clothes came off,
it's just his lips on my neck
and his hand in my hair,
he spanks me so hard i have dark bruises
but i consented-
teasing me, he calls it
but I still
can't
breathe
and i'm wishing that i'd gone out
with his fiance for the night
when she invited me.
when his roommate walks through the door
it takes everything not to heave out
a sigh of relief
and i never thought i could feel this way
but he's 24
and he almost reminds me of you
but he's not you and he's on top of me
and i'm moaning and giggling
but i still can't breathe
he's autistic, he doesn't pick up on cues
he doesn't get rules
he was involved with another 17 year old
a while back, he says
because he's different and that's what i liked about him
and then his lips are grazing my skin
and i giggle and i moan
but i still
can't
*******
breathe.

This is my story.
It's my first poem in months
and suddenly
I'm stuck.
I've been lying in bed for so long
that I lost my voice,
I think I wrote so many words
for my ex-boyfriend
that I have none left for myself.
My life is a whirlwind
of passing daydreams and photographs
and empty cigarette packs
and cold cups of coffee
and pieces of other peoples' poems...
Pieces of my own poems that I barely remember writing.
I spend my time trying to ignore
the sighs of discontent
in the back of my mind,
echoing across the walls of my brain,
trying to provide a way to relate
to the people I know
but it's hard when
I can barely relate to myself.
I am a work in progress.
The scars that litter me
are fading fast,
but I'm standing still
while the world moves around me.
Inhaling the toxicity and
exhaling the stardust of my peers,
surrounded by memories
locking me in place,
peeling from the walls of my being
like paper,
this is my story.
It's a written and rewritten masterpiece
that I have no record of
because I gave up on journalling
a while ago,
because my life isn't necessarily one
I'd sit down with a glass of wine
and write about at the end of the day.
It's full of torn pages,
crossed out sentences
and smudged words.
I guess those things come of a story unfinished-
of a work in progress.

There are blotches of red marks on my skin, my face,
bags under my eyes, 
I get around 5 hours of sleep most nights 
but every morning I still feel like I haven't slept in a century. 
This is a different kind of pain.
This isn't a migraine, or a stomachache. 
This is more than a stomachache. 
This is waking up every morning to arms full of scars that are so ******* triggering,
A stomach screaming "feed me" but skipping breakfast and lunch 
because I swear to ******* god, I've gained weight. 
This is a different kind of pain. 
This is my first poem in months which is why 
it doesn't fit together perfectly 
but since I penned all of my thoughts about 
my eating disorder, my self harm, my mental illnesses and my boyfriend,
I didn't have anything to say, 
I'd given my voice away by that point 
and that caused a different kind of pain.