these days i am stuck
choosing between binding and breathing
because nobody knew to tell me
that wearing this less severe corset
for more than eight hours at a time
could turn my ribs into a steel trap
around my lungs and my skin
would be able to count the seconds
that ticked by as that fabric
rubbed tighter and tighter
against my body

but it was worth it
at least for the first few minutes
until my breath became trapped
inside my body somewhere
between my lungs and my
nose and my mouth
and climbing three flights of stairs
from one class to the next felt
like running a marathon
with my legs tied together

and standing naked from the
waist up in the women’s bathroom
hating every second of wrestling the
binder off of sweat-soaked skin
made me want to reach into
my body through sheer force of will
and years of hatred
and scoop out the fat that made
up my *******

and i am accustomed to this
the want to remove the parts
of me that make people
tie me to the words
of she
and girl
and her
and mother
and sister
and woman
and and and
those things that i am not
those things that i never was
those things that i never will be

wanting to cut off
the parts of me that continue to lock
me into the involuntary box of
the female gender
makes me feel like a freak
and a monster
and a bad person for not loving
the body that a god with a penchant
for sick jokes stuck me in

but some days the dysphoria
makes it tempting to choose
binding over breathing
because even though my tolerance
for doing so is only about an hour
at this point isn’t an hour of relief
better than nothing at all