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Sometimes woman feels like a stain on my chest
Dark and descriptive
Some Dark Thing that seeps
Through my sweater and into my skin
Sticky and strange underneath
Makes me squirm just a little to the left
Of my instinct
This thing that stings like a million mistakes
I haven’t had a chance to make
I hide the strangest spots with clothes
Sunday best or something
Pour anatomy too angular
Into a dainty church dress
Maybe I can fool a congregation long enough
For God to reimagine me
A little less damaged
From the pew I feel Pastor's eyes like lasers
Slicing through my artless disguise
Exposing the unsubtle shape underneath
He mumbles something about Eve
Looks at me like Paradise Lost personified
Woman spews out of me
Thick and putrid
Down my front
Soon I trade church dresses for oversized flannels
And high school boys (bless their egos)
Raise overgrown
Overconfident eyebrows at me
Why do you dress like such a dyke now?
An unfamiliar aggression slipped into each word in the question
Like sedatives into a screwdriver
I say “they’re just comfortable”
Then swiftly realize my mistake
No one wants a woman to be comfortable
I squirm in my underwire bra
It presses back into me, hard against my bone
Squirm is a good word
It's how I feel in this bra
Underneath the weight of that word Dyke
Three brothers golden retriever pile themselves onto me
An amorphous mass of sibling affection
Odd angles all around
My stepmom pokes her head in
Says “don’t you mess with my girl”
Single syllable
Tongue curled
And cadence sweet
I catch her words
Drape them around me like a hug
When you're a girl
You're someone's family
When you're a woman
You're someone's problem
If I could just wear woman like she wears woman
I wouldn’t be such a problem.
I wear woman more like a stiff uniform
An idiopathic expectation I stuff myself into
Though it’s obvious I’m five sizes too tall
A soul-and-a-half too wild
Often underneath it
I feel that same sticky substance
Staining me from the inside out
Body balanced against the changing-room wall
I seek a disguise that lies the least
Hiking identifiers up past my knees
Like thrifted pairs of genes
Pronouns all tangled
In rapidly-changing hairstyles
As I bring them down around my shoulders
I come across a gently-loved pair
Of distressed denim overalls
They slide up smooth over all my pained parts
Leaving just enough space for a cuff
Above quintessentially queer combat boots
I am a product of my own artistry
A scarred specimen still sacred
Both muse and masterpiece beginning
To sort out the likeness of a familiar femme
Still uncertain about this skin
Whether everything within
Renders me survivor or sickness
I sneak a little smile at my unconventional reflection
And thank Goddess
That I still have half a life left
To wear woman however the hell I want.