the nicest thing you ever did was turn

me into a boy though

you didn’t mean well

by it, not by a long shot

you were simply greedy

for femininity and we

sipped bubblegum soup

together cold

and sparkly; no one was home

I painted a face

once, the prototype

of female evil, all

the women in my family

resembled it, bad witches

but you were the first

woman to ever hurt me &

change my shape, made me

hump you like a clueless dude

who pretends to know

what he’s doing

I was a sucker

for vulnerable heroes, hurt

& wounded men

with feelings who were

sad but never cried

strong spirit & gritted teeth

pride & spite

—those shows I

loved the most, I

wanted to be as surprising

uprising & unsettling in my pain

too

just an hour

later I passed out from loneliness

& woke up for the first

time in my life when I heard

a friend saying how you told her

it was about fucking time for me to get laid

& that’s why you traded me in

to a man 15 years older than me

even though you knew

what he was like

but you just wanted me

to spare you my unheroic sadness

I imagine you both

haggling: will you fuck

my cousin, she needs to lose

her virginity. — Hell yeah,

I love it

when they’re tight &

innocent & I am the first

I could even pretend

to care about her.

Deal.

who cares what followed—you

sure as hell don’t; but

what is worse than anything

he did is the fact that this

friend keeps visiting you despite

all the things she knows

you’ve done

to me despite

my sobs

losing it to Lingua Ignota

but all my life

I’ve learned to have nothing

to myself & that people

are won over so easily, even I

sometimes love you

watch me bury my self

pity: I’ve grown tough

enough, a raining man

with a joy for getting lost

in words

sometimes

I suspect that softness

is a trap

& I merrily wonder

how much longer will they

tolerate me how much

longer until they throw me

out of this yellow house