Poetry

My mother was born with a green ribbon wrapped around her left thumb

I stumble through life like a dehydration-addled ascetic in a desert during the apocalypse

In the quiet nights of winter 
The air sighs with an icy chill 

Monday grips a pen
Neurotic scribbles fill a blank page

You just are, no need to play a part

Names and Pronouns and Sexuality

Can change as easily as the seasons 

It is accepted and no less normal

One bite at a time 
my mother says as it sits there 
in my kitchen 
blowing dish-soap bubbles 
through its pool-noodle nose.

It fills my body 
Fills my body so full of light 
I am almost bursting at the seams with 
Joy so infectious I cannot avoid it if I wanted to

I can’t bear
To draw self-portraits of myself.
I don’t trust mirrors
And I don’t trust my eyes.

Aethiopia, Abyssinia, Askum, Kush
All names thrown around by history books, by scholars 
Attempting to intellectualize, rationalize, standardize 
the place my parents call home 

I blame you for everything –
I blame myself for even more.
I’m dumb and stubborn; you, careless.