tenderheart
Legally,
I am a man now,
according to the Georgia Department
of Driving Services
It feels surreal,
three decades later
and my paperwork no longer lyin’ on me
I think I am supposed to feel
like the truth now
I think my driver’s license
is a transgender death certificate
This is made complicated
by the fact that I refuse
to eulogize the Black girl,
disappeared by my surgeon
so good it’s almost like
she was never here
This is not a death
Me and that imaginary girl are just
on the run together
Hiding under sunglasses
and too-large hoodies
and trying not to turn our heads
when someone calls us by our old names
It’s funny how the world
only searches for missing Black girls
after they’ve confessed
that they never really were girls
just Black and missing
Perfect in their unwillingness
to be what the world said
what a nigga said
what I said yesterday because
I reserve the right to change my mind–
change my hair and
pop my shit
Rewrite my name over
and over and over
with different letters
until it starts looking right
make you memorize every new spelling,
and then forget them all
if I say so
And maybe today I am a man–
yesterday a Black girl
and while I’m asleep,
I’m nothing but a pyre of ‘almosts’
and ‘never agains’
The sparks between my synapses
threaten to catch ablaze
and engulf every version
of the person that I performed today
The first time
I swim in a lake after top surgery,
chest bared to the wild
just like twenty years prior
I register
that I am topless and tasty
and terrified
I am torn open
and suddenly so much taller
I get a mosquito bite
just above my nipple
and for some reason
this feels like a gift to me
Afterwards my sister’s friend
and I laugh about the blood tax
for wanting to go shirtless in public
I tell her how scary it was
And how absolutely thrilling
I wonder if I’ll ever be able to strip myself
without a moment’s hesitation
Toss my shirt to the ground
and run for water
She says
yeah, isn’t it funny
how they make it all about the body
Being in the wrong body
Needing to change your body
Like,
I’m sure you thought it was your chest
that was holding you back,
and now
now you realize
it was the shame
if I must live after Refaat Alareer
Kelsey L. Smoot (They/Them/He/Him) is a full-time PhD student in the interdisciplinary social sciences and humanities. They are also a poet, advocate, and frequent writer of critical analysis. Kelsey’s debut chapbook, we was bois together, recently came out with CLASH! an Imprint of Mouthfeel Press.
