there is a girl out there
dressed in slacks and a button-down
who wears a lace-bra underneath
to protect the girl hidden under there.
she thinks everyone beat her to it
that the erosive illusion of masculinity
has buried too deep into her skin
that even a face-lift can’t lift it.
she’s strong enough to dig a hole
to bury herself in it day after day,
and she can’t stop digging in,
even when she wears short-shorts.
being a woman is violent,
but when they think you’re a man
you’re just completely forgotten
obituaries are just another type of sunset.
there are losses to becomings
and there are becomings within losses
and to lose, in many ways, is to become
and to become is to lose in many ways.
strangers on the internet are just a fantastic release
when she turns her web-cam on, face-hidden,
hardly anyone ever tunes in,
but when someone does, it’s like suddenly she exists.
and she does get hard sometimes,
but it’s not an eroticism born of others’ flesh
it’s the liberation of knowing anyone has seen her skin,
even if they only looked because she’s over 6 inches.
it’s like she’s wearing a scarlet letter on her chest,
that she only ever reveals to the anonymous eye,
it’s not that she fears disclosure,
she fears the power that disclosure has over her psyche.
maybe it’s why gay men say clubbing at midnight is fun,
so that if they have to become women,
they can remember a reference for midnight
other than vodka, cruising, and porn.
people who judge the lonely
and the ways loneliness can corrupt the soul
do not understand the pain of being alone
online and offline, in heaven and hell.
it’s how capitalism kills trans women,
more than 40% have attempted suicide,
because people tell us that were alone
and that we’re supposed to be and stay that way.
trans women are not angels or saints,
but there have been far too many martyrs.
if strangers on the internet keep you going,
that is a survival story, not a pile of shame.
for centuries, trans women have been jailed and policies for existing.
and when they cannot do it with prisons,
they do it mentally and spiritually and with their faith.
cisgender people don’t know anything about faith.
and if a cisgender person has learned something about faith,
it’s because they’ve been treated like a trans woman.
they say porn isn’t political,
but porn is relief from the loneliness for the lonely people,
and claiming that loneliness is not political,
is like saying that someone didn’t choose to paint god white.
and my skin is white and lonely,
which is why I try to paint over it with every real color of life.
i wish I could tell myself a prayer
that would make loneliness go away
but AA slogans are not a solution to the games the world plays.
what is the solution?
I don’t know the solution,
but I can still remember when midnight was fun.
