Wednesday, October 26, 2016

negative space


the morning is cloudy
smells like water
and the sky is full of cranes and their cooing
song says
stay warm
move as you must
sing

I need the sky full of cranes to fill the space you are not in
I need soft steady companions
I need purpose
and as the mundane and the routines come slowly back
into focus
I realize they are the remedy
the dirty dishes are there to ground me cover my hands
in warm moving water

the laundry waits for me
in warm moving water
the bath waits for me
to come clean
come back

move as i must
stay warm

I need to fill the spaces you are not in
I need to feed the cat
I need to warm water
for a tea of roses
I need all the roses
I need my lovers soft steady hands to bring my skin back
from following you out to the negative space
that waits for us all

I gave you my softest steadiest hands
cooing to you
as you died

I caught it all in a
small cup of water

I poured it onto rosemary
this morning
beneath the cranes.


-for Agatha



                  



Saturday, October 15, 2016

last call femme incantation



I’m with the witches
and the whores
the seeded queens
the beauty makers

the rusty dragons
downers
and loose change

I’m with risk

and a bad turn

I eat the rich

like any spell casting
pre- internet harlot
would

I’m in it for the cash crop

I’m with thorns

the stay the fuck off me

the make a wish moon

say come closer
there’s plenty for everyone

I’m with water

and the rusted beauty
she creates
as empires fall
I’m with
the seeded the sashay the unstoppable
rising shining
queens
that teach us love.






Sunday, July 3, 2016

I am not Orlando



I’m a lot of things survivor
one bad turna luck from hungry
I’m sick and low class and as queer
as it comes shocked and I’m grieving

but I am not Orlando

colonization did not destroy my homeland
demonize my heart
leave me lookin for sanctuary
on a dazzling dance floor of family rhythms and tongues
leave my open joy a target

and yeah,  
I started hitting the bars at 15
twirling under lights or tucked up in back corner darkness
riding out something horrible in the humid n heaving
safety of the club

but whiteness took me takes me home safer than most
handed me the power of citizenship at birth

hell, even in the welfare line I’ve got “potential”

and my fellow white trans and queer folk
while we mire in rainbow slick pools of grief and privilege
let’s remember this
white supremacy is designed to strip us of depth and meaning
leave us empty save for that unspilled lavender blood
eager for narratives that simulate connection

since privilege only disconnects

whiteness always harvests trauma

serves it up with heightened security
rainbow cops
gay friendly prison TV shows
and how quickly all the queer and trans black and brown ghosts
are woven seamlessly into grant deadlines and no fly lists
right along side our most tender truest bleeding hearts

and I’m a lotta things,
the colonizers daughter,
a sick and useless casualty of capitalism,
a bottom feeder
and I know death and I know loss
but whiteness gets me through it safer than most
less a target and not a ghost

so my fellow white queers
lets not harvest lets not honeymoon
and call it equality
lets not settle down on top of black, brown n indigenous lives and consume
lets not whitewash this trauma and hand it to profit
lets not whitewash 500 years of resistance

lets not call the cops

let’s check our legacies
shift our resistance to deep foundational change
let’s call each other over
        call each other in

cuz while we are a lot of things all tender,
fucked up and beautiful

we are not Orlando






























































































Thursday, March 10, 2016

when heartbreak


puts your back out pulls 
an endless supply of ocean from your eyes
and hot water makes you howl and moan
makes you take inventory counting bills
in every hidden envelope
means you lie flat on hot then cold turned carefully 
so some of that shit’s gonna be ok sunshine
soaks the soles of your feet
when ghost cats purr in your lap
when time drowns in shock
and love is root stock, terpenes and salt

heartbreak rolls stone
exposes grief curling up shocked at the sudden light

decocts tannins and flowers with thorns
boundaryless body pain that stops you
means nothing at all
but steep and wait
stroke ghosts
don't drown






Sunday, January 10, 2016

watercolor.
image: text reads "immigrants and refugees welcome here" on a light orange background with a large pink wild rose in the center and smaller dark green leaves of a rose bush with buds and rose hips framing the text.

grief is a beast


a hard lover

smoke

that leaves
debris lodged
unseen and dangerous

inside

a deep calm body
of grey water
grief
is bodies becoming
battleground
ghosts
becoming
only hearts
only blue suffocated blood

circulating through us just lookin for holes

grief is a hole

vacates
whenever

returns
whenever