"I kissed a feminist once",
he says, face flushed blotchy, something heavy resting on his shoulders
maybe
“I kissed a feminist once,”
and everybody laughs
“she was cold as ice,” he says
and he doesn’t mention how I turned
warm beneath his fingers,
heated up like embers
and reduced his bed to flame and ashes
“God was she mean,” he says
but he hasn’t forgotten the time
I told him to be kind to himself, to
purge the poison from his veins and
scrape the smoke from his lungs
“I love you I love you I love you”
I said,
“please love yourself too”
“I kissed a feminist once,”
he says, to loud guffaws,
an elbow in his side
and he doesn’t say “her lips
were the softest thing to ever brush
my collar bone”
he doesn’t say “she made playlists in my mind”
or “she covered me like a blanket”
or “her teeth on my earlobe ripped me open and scattered me across the sheets of her twin bed”
he doesn’t say “I loved that
storm of a girl,
I loved her heavy at 4am I loved
her like pennies
at the bottom of a fountain
like memorized freckles
I loved her like depth perception
like opposable thumbs
I loved her I loved her I loved her”
and instead he shrugs
that heavy thing off his shoulders
and shrugs the feel of my lips
off his chest and he says,
“she was a crazy ***** anyway”
- Lily Cigale

Being transgender is like this:
Everyday of your life, you have always wanted a dog.
For as long as you can remember--
even if you don't know to what extent--
you have wanted one.

You asked your parents, Santa, the easter bunny,
even the tooth fairy.
Then one day you get a dead cat for your birthday.
You say "This isn't a dog,"
But "You get what you get and don't get upset"
So you carry around and care for the dead carcass.

All sorts of people look at you,
unable to understand what you are doing.
So then one day you decide to try to make it look a bit nicer.
You wash it a bit, comb what little fur it has left,
cover the decrepit limbs.

But then you realize the futility in doing this all the time,
because you are still carrying around a dead animal.
So you continue to carry it around because you have to,
no matter how horrible it may be.

Although you are carrying around a dead and rotting cat,
you aren't a ******* cat owner;

You still want a ******* dog.

We live in a nation where
People prefer to fall asleep
Holding their phones
Instead of their partners
And we wonder why
Romance is dying.

the fatalist in me thinks about a Trump vote
quietly marking the box that will end the American dream
snickering to myself as the ballot falls into the bin
knowing I have done my part to bring about the end –
destroying families across the land
and building a wall greater than any Chinese design
breaking the back of a faltering agricultural system
asking the masses of impoverished to stand right there with him –
expressing a desire to actually nuke Iran
and that the military would rival that of any era
planning on expanding our empire abroad
telling the public that peace is a fraud –
I cannot help the reality that I am entertained
frozen with terror, eyes peeled to the spectacle
this train wreck developing is really just catching speed
could the American people willingly vote for greed –
there is only one way to bring about the end of days
and like anything it takes work, practice, and dedication
but this move seems more real than any before
we are all being wooed by Babylon’s ***** –
I, for one, am going to sit back and enjoy this ride
it’s not often one gets to see the fall of Rome
a nice mountain lake; spring fed and crystal clear
waits hidden in the mountains if the end gets too near –
see, having a plan means there’s no reason to worry
and gives me the advantage to vote for your doom
while most of you sit, hands folded to pray
I’ll hike to the hills when we come to the end of days –
maybe I won’t survive the coming nuclear battle
when ‘the donald’ shoots his mouth off to Vladimir Putin
or Kim Jon, or Iran, or the Afghani folks
but until then I will prepare and go on making jokes –