For Amari, A Love Letter

It is only because I love you this much that I promise that I will never stop being your villain.

I will stand next to her in your mind so that all my dark eats up her light, and you can’t make out a single one of her flaws next to my black mass of wrong.

When she makes you cry, I’ll slither out of that lonely place in your skull and ask you to remember all those time that, though you begged for me to stop, I murdered all the parts of you that loved me right before your eyes. I will curl up in your ear and whisper true stories of my own selfishness and self-inflicted suffering.

That night that you showed up when I was on stage and said that all you wanted was to dance beside me, all you wanted was to feel the heat of my body, and I let you stay but would not allow you to touch me, not really touch me.

That night that you showed up on my doorstep scared and said all you wanted was to lie down next to me, all you wanted was for me to hold you through the night, and I let you into my bed but would not allow you my arms to wrap yourself in.

That night you showed me your scars and said that all you wanted was to feel wanted, all you wanted was for my love to stop the bleeding, and I let you myself kiss you but would not allow our lips to touch.

That night you showed me I hadn’t lost you and said that all you wanted was a smart girl like me, all you wanted was someone to care for, and I let you stay but would not allow you to call yourself my girlfriend.

That night you showed me you’d die without me and said that all you’d wanted was to see your ring on my finger, and all you wanted was for me to care that you’d thrown that ring in the river, and I let you cry and would not allow myself to begin to fix it.

That night you showed me the dress you’d picked out for your date with her and said that all she  wanted was to see your hair in braids, and all you wanted was for her to like you, and I let you go and would not allow myself to chase her car down the street when she picked you up from my apartment.

It took more than three years for me to fully dismember your love for me, for me to gut your heart and stitch it up hollow, so that you could fill it with feelings for someone better, someone who could love you the way that you deserve to be loved. And I hope you never know how happy I am that you’ve found her or how it hurts a little more each day that you still hate me. I hope you never find out about the mornings that I can’t get out of bed because I know you’ll never lie next to me again. I hope you never think that maybe I've changed, that maybe it could work now, because I know that thinking like that only holds me back.

Which is why, all I want is to be your villain. My place is that shadowy space in your memory, from which I appear only to reassure you that you’ve made the right decision marrying her and promising to love her happily ever after. I want to be your villain as long as it keeps you safe, as long as it keeps you from hurting, as long as it keeps you from regretting, as long as it keeps you from missing me, as long as you need me to be.

Lessons in Self-Preservation

I am proud to confess to you that I am a murderer. Please believe me when I say that we'd all be better off if we did a little killing every once in awhile.

This morning I looked in the mirror and saw that my eyes looked more tired than usual. And that's when the voices started up—sad, mean, angry, desperate voices—familiar voices. These voices have been with me since I can remember. When I was learning to walk, they were there, telling me I wasn't strong enough to stand on my own two feet. They've kept me from sleeping—incessantly whispering in my ears that failure is inevitable. They've kept me from eating—pinching the fat on my side and tsk-tsking when I've thought of ordering pizza. They've kept me from loving—shouting so loudly that I could never hear my sweetheart's soft words over those goddamn voices' unkind cries.

But it was not until today that I actually crawled inside myself and found a horde of sick, sick people living inside me. I came face-to-face with a girl with eyes the color of three-day-old bruises and hair the color of thick scabs, and it was when I noticed the scars on her wrists that I recognized her. She was the part of myself who was always trying to disassemble Venus razors and take them to my wrists at the slightest sign of emotional turmoil. She was the one who, when I was sad and she without a blade, would dig her fingernails into my flesh until blood was drawn. She was the one who stashed a bottle of sleeping pills in the drawer by my bed and whispered as I sobbed, "Just finish the whole bottle, darling. And maybe you'll wake up tomorrow and feel better, or maybe you won't wake up at all! And wouldn't that be marvelous if you didn't wake up at all?"

"There is no reason to be afraid to die" were her last words before I forced handfuls of pills down her throat. I handed her a bottle of merlot and watched her drain it. I was only slightly surprised that she did not struggle when I took each of her wrists in my hands and cut her from palm to elbow. Her blood poured from her body like wine from a broken bottle, and I felt an intoxicating surge of strength at the sight of it.

After that it was easy. I forced fountain pens through the eyes of the cantankerous old man who was constantly convincing me that my words weren't worth reading and reduced him to a wrinkly twitch before bashing his skull in with a dictionary.

After snapping her twig bones, I reached right into the ribcage of the waif who'd been bent on starving me skinny since I can remember. I devoured her plump heart before her eyes and did not worry about the calories.

And then, without batting an eye, I took a blowtorch to her sister's face, that bitch who never let me leave the house without makeup on.

Using the muscle in my thighs, I strangled the broad-shouldered man who'd made me believe I was never strong enough.

And then the thin man who'd called me a slut night after night screamed, "But I'm a nice guy!" before I castrated him and watched him writhe before he bled out.

I slaughtered every part of myself who'd ever caused me to start a sentence with "I can't." I tore limb from limb every person inside me who'd ever made me feel small. And when all of the corpses of the voices who had made it impossible to love myself were finally in a pile, I felt better than I had in my entire life.

I painted my lips and cheeks and eyelids with the blood of the dead parts of myself, and when I caught my reflection in the crimson pool at my feet, I found myself so fiercely beautiful that I never wanted to look away. As I stared into the scarlet, I realized that I had created for myself an endless supply of ink. Now I'm free to create a million works of art, but first, I want all of you to be free, too.

You are all you will ever certainly have, and it is essential to love yourself. Self-hatred is a crime punishable by death—either your death or the death of all those voices in your head insisting that you're unlovable. Never in my life have I condoned violence, but after today, I say if there is a part of you that makes you hurt so much that sometimes you question whether life is worth living, if there is a part of you that paralyzes you, prevents you from filling your life with meaning, he or she must be sacrificed. Take a machete to your meanest parts. Poison the pieces of you who hold you back. Turn their blood into poetry. You owe it to yourself. You'll feel better, I promise.

Fire: A Love Story

Tell me again how we were bound from birth like the wildest animals bred in captivity, born in cages. Tell me again how baptism by fire won't work on wolves like us. Tell me again how even star-crossed arsonists deserve to be loved.
Tell me about the time when you were fifteen, the first time you put something burning between your lips; tell me again how I was busy wailing, bloody, cold, eyes opened for the very first time.
Tell me about that night that you turned twenty and didn't care if you lived or died, how your lungs felt like they'd crumble easy as ash—how that same night my parents began to hide the lighters because I'd stick my fingers in the flames wanting so badly to catch fire.
I can't remember if it was when you were turning thirty or if it was the year that I turned sixteen that we made homes inside warm women's arms and curled up quiet. Wasn't it within a month that we burned those homes at the stake for aiding and abetting known criminals? How many fires did we start in all? How many innocents do you think were burned?
Tell me the one about how a woman loved you for who you could be, just like a girl loved me for who I once was. Tell me how she saw the light in you, just like she refused to see the dark in me. Tell me again how star-crossed arsonists deserve to be loved.
Remind me again about that time that I thought true love meant the end of self-inflicted suffering because I found a girl who'd use me as an ashtray. Tell me how I made that false discovery at the same moment that the doctors were sure they'd found cancer in you, and you kept on with your pack a day. Tell me how when I woke up alone on a red-stained pillow and licked crusted blood from my lip, they told you there was no tumor. Tell me how your girlfriend said she'd stay on the same day they insisted that the smoke was causing my nosebleeds. Tell me how my lips were numb from tobacco when you found her suitcases packed and ready to go.
Tell me about when we ran out of lighter fluid. Tell me about when we ran out of cigarettes. Tell me about when we were unhappy and there was no one left to blame. Please, remind me again how star-crossed arsonists deserve to be loved.
Tell me how they chained us before we ever met, tell me how watching me walk through your door felt like coming face-to-face with the convict you'd been cuffed to your entire sentence, each of us with hands crossed behind our backs and bound together. Tell me again how when my skin blisters you feel it. Tell me again how when you suffocate from the smoke I stop breathing. Tell me again how we each love an arsonist though we hated ourselves half our lives.
Don't say that I'm still a child with my hand held to a candle. Don't tell me you're just an addict with a box of matches. Leave out how this could consume us. I just need to hear you tell me one last time how even wild animals who've burned down whole forests deserve love like ours.

A Theory of Evolution, a poem by Alice Urchin

The audio and video don’t sync up perfectly, which makes this kinda weird (especially because it’s such a somber topic), but the audio is really the important part, so I’m still posting it in hopes that you’ll be able to ignore the weirdness. 

This is a poem I especially felt I needed to write after all of the (mostly horrifying) coverage of the Steubenville Rape Case.

A Theory of Evolution

The rules of the Old Testament are no longer in play;

The you-break-it, you-buy-it policy no longer applies to my hymen.

If you steal me and destroy me, turn me into something unsellable,

you are no longer required to pay for me in full

and keep me in your home as a reminder of what you did wrong.

No, today we know better,

We have evolved,

We are enlightened,

We are no longer barbarians,

I am no longer an object.

Today, if you damage these goods,

I will not be forced to haunt your bed,

I will not be required to lurk in your kitchen,

presiding over your every meal,

cleaning your bathroom with bleach,

fixing your coffee with extra cream,

and never ever the other way around.

Today, you will not have your hands cut off for touching 
that which does not belong to you,

You will not be expected to pay my family a fee

for ruining their only daughter.

No, today were are enlightened.

Today we know better.

Today I will not rip my dress and beat my chest

to signify that I have been sullied,

if I did that strangers would only stop

to stare or shoot me sidelong sultry glances.

Today I am instructed to shout “FIRE!”

if I want people to come running;

I am encouraged to carry a pistol in my purse

because guns are the great equalizer,

unless of course you find yourself half-conscious

on the floor of a family friend’s hotel room,

but nevermind that.

No, today we are evolved.

We are no longer barbarians.

Today I am no man’s property,

Today I am liberated, free,

I am equal, they tell me.

Now that we know better,

Now that we have evolved.

And so my rapists still have their limbs in tact,

They still have their hands, their fingers, all their toes.

They have never been beaten, whipped, flogged, nor stoned.

They bear no scars, no marks impressed upon their flesh.

They have not had to pay in gold for the damage they inflicted upon me

Because I am human now, no longer an object with a price.

I no longer belong to my father, I am no longer an item of value.

I am just a girl who wanted to have a good time,

who was not suspicious enough of a gentleman’s kindness.

We are enlightened now.

I am just a girl, a warm bag of flesh not belonging to anyone; 
there were no insurance policies taken out on my safety.

Now we know better.

I am just a girl who is no longer welcome in her boyfriend’s bed because of her bad judgment.

I am no man’s property.

I am just a girl who will be paying for her own PAP smear and pregnancy test.

I am liberated, free.

I am just a girl being likened to a whore in a court of law.

I am equal, they tell me.

I am just a girl who was not lucky enough to have her insides swabbed

in time to collect DNA.

Now we have evolved.

I am just a girl whose case was made public and then thrown out 
due to lack of evidence that I wasn’t asking for it.

Because I am a human now, no longer an object.

I am a human with the power to give my consent.

And we are enlightened now, no longer barbarians.

Today we are liberated, we are equal,

Everyone enjoys the same freedoms:

My rapists walk free,

and so do I, or so they tell me.

            

Piercings

I look you
in the eye
as you hold
the piercing
gun to my flesh
and I feel
nothing

other than the scratchy
fabric of the
raggedy-ass
couch in my
stepdad's basement.

You flash
a smile,
like you do
when you know
you're doing
something
really fucked up,

something that would
show up
in one of those movies
meant to scare teens away
from sex
and drugs
and
living life,

something like plotting
to deflower a mute kid
in a precarious three-way
in your best friend's basement
while his older brother
is distracted upstairs
with a box of
Walmart-brand donuts
and a glass of chocolate milk,

something like going through
with that fucked
three-way donut plan
and then
immediately after
piercing
your best friend's ears
with as many
earrings
as you can fit
around the edges
of her
red
blood-filled
ears

as she stares blankly
at your
stained
glass
churchyard
eyes
just waiting
for
the
click
of
the
gun.

Exit Exam for a Codependent, Emotionally Abusive, Eight-Year Relationship with a Bulimic Sociopath

True or False: It is okay to eat an entire box of frozen waffles for breakfast as long as you do not eat lunch or dinner and no one is around to see you do it. 

True or False: Lying is only okay if it is part of a grander scheme to make someone feel bad who made you feel bad first. Lies that take the blame off you so you don't get fired, arrested, etc. are also acceptable. White lies are alright, too, if you can’t think of something funny to say.

True or False: It is acceptable to steal from department stores because they are not people with feelings or mortgages or children to feed.

True or False: Self-mutilation is so punk rock.

True or False: If you’re not sure if it’s a shirt or a dress, you should wear it as a dress and gauge how much attention you get to find your answer.  

True or False: Spicy foods should be avoided, as they will burn coming back up, which will mean your eyes will tear up, which will mean your mascara will run, which will mean you’ll look like you were crying, which will mean that nobody will want to fuck you because you’ll look like an emotional disaster.

True or False: Don’t shit where you eat. Meaning, don’t steal from your work place, don’t fuck your coworkers, don’t let your manager make copies of the security tape of you fucking him against the drink machine, etc.

True of False: Friends don’t fuck friends’ boyfriends, even if the friend in question is in an abusive relationship and needs a concrete reason to leave him. 

True or False: If your stomach is growling loudly during your lemon ginger cleanse diet, it is acceptable to slap your well-meaning friend who makes a joke about hearing whale songs every time you walk by.

True or False: It is morally permissible to fuck your best friend’s ex-boyfriend if you and he are both drunk and you’re pretty sure that there’s no way she could ever possibly find out about it.

True or False: It not is acceptable to call your best friend a “disease-ravaged cunt,” even if she does, in fact, have Chlamydia, and she is, in fact, acting like a cunt.

True or False: It is okay to scratch your best friends’ eyes out when you test positive for Chlamydia and your boyfriend is the only person you’ve fucked in recent memory.

True or False: If it doesn’t hurt, you’re not doing it right.

Momma

he cannot understand how much the word
mother sounds like the word martyr
when it passes through my ears
which momma pierced when I turned four
because I wanted to wear earrings
like a Disney princess
because I wanted to feel pretty

pretty like momma
who attended aerobics classes religiously
after she had my youngest sister
despite the fact that the birth
had wrecked her insides
and left her bedridden for weeks
despite the fact that she was anemic
and the doctors advised her to take it easy
she needed to lose the baby weight
while daddy was at work

because daddy had money
daddy wore tailored suits
and daddy looked good
and daddy went on business trips
and daddy stayed late
and daddy sometimes didn't come home at all
and she thought that she could win
him back by losing fifteen pounds

so momma cooked us spaghetti
and sometimes ribs or steak or grilled cheese
and always tacos on Tuesdays
and consumed only after-dinner mints herself
the kind that come in pastel colors
and turn soft on your tongue
when you suck on them

momma curled her hair every morning
and she always let me watch
after taking a Sharpie to her curlers
and writing HOT so I remembered not to touch
she let me sit cross-legged on the counter
and after she took out the curlers
she shook her head like a lion
and I would make roaring sounds
and she would sometimes shout,
"I am woman! Hear me roar!"

and she would spend one full hour making herself up
which I always thought was an apt description
for the transformation she went through
it was like making up a new person
a new person with new features
all different colors and sizes
from the ones you were born with
all much, much prettier

but daddy left her anyway
left her for someone younger
someone with different hair
someone with plastic in her tits
someone with even more self-esteem issues
someone who didn't eat anything, even after-dinner mints
left her with three blonde little girls
who did not quite grasp the meaning
of the word "divorce" when it was explained to them
during the muted commercial break of a Christmas special

and momma's daddy left her not long after
though he'd kept a secret family in another city
they never took him from her
cancer did
he kept on through December
through the birthday he shared with my baby sister
through Christmas and New Year's
but winter was too much for an old man
whose internal organs had long since turned black

it's hard to say whether it was the funeral or the divorce
that made it so clear to me:
my momma was somebody's baby abandoned
and left to cry through the night with no one to hold her
no one to pick her up and say, It's okay, you're okay
it's hard to say at what age it would have been okay
for me to put down my baby dolls
to climb into my momma's bed and to cradle her instead

fifth-grade girls only have so much wisdom to give
but I learned that broken bones from sticks and stones
don't bruise and scar like words hurled in broken homes
and there is no nursery rhyme to teach you the best way
to ask your mother if she's been eating
or to tell her that you don't like it when she smokes so much
because Grandpa smoked that much too

I was a smart girl and science was my favorite subject
I stayed after school to learn the parts of the heart
I was excited to tell momma that two boys fainted
because of all the blood, but not me
but elementary school science never taught me
how much wine is fine for a 98-lb. woman
with an addictive personality
and how much will cause her to forget
to pick her daughter up from science club

though it did show me what it's like
to hold a heart in your hands
and momma says that having a baby
is just like wearing your heart outside your body
I always wanted to trap hers under glass to keep it safe
because I didn't trust her ribcage to do the job

but my momma was somebody's baby, too
and she ripped my heart from its safe place
with words not worth repeating
oblivious to the damage she'd done
the way that I'd ripped her favorite pair of gold earrings
from her ears as an infant reaching out for anything

she left me bleeding and then looked around
like she was unaware of what she'd done
all because I replaced her wine with juice
and her pot with crushed leaves
and her cigarettes with cancer facts
I taught myself to make spaghetti which she never touched
I stayed up all night cleaning the kitchen which she never noticed
I hated my stepdad for fueling her depression with drugs
instead of telling her that she was perfect the way she was

and all I was trying to say was that she was loved
but she couldn't see it, not at the time
and I hated her for that
so that's what I started telling her
I watched a little piece of her commit suicide each time that I said it
though it seemed to be what she wanted
to kill herself bit by bit
at the time it made me hurt less
I felt stronger each time those words crashed
through the gates of my unkissed lips

but now it just makes me scared
scared of broken condoms
of forgotten pills
of little pink plus signs
scared of seeing my heart outside my body
in the tiny hands of someone predisposed to all my flaws
and all of my mother's

he cannot understand how much the word
daughter sounds like the word martyr
when it passes through my ears
or through my mother's
which are scarred because of me
and my need to grab ahold of who I love
to pull them toward me no matter how much it hurts

Obligatory Coming Out Poem

I remember the first time someone asked me if I liked girls.
And, the funny thing is, that I remember saying, "No!"
in the exact same way that I had ten years earlier
on the playground
the first time that I was accused of liking boys,
who, at the time, were infested with cooties—
we were sure of it.

And then five years later, when a friend confessed
that she'd always wanted to kiss a girl, just to see,
but that she had realized that day,
while getting her hair done at a salon,
that she could not possibly be bisexual
because she saw a male hairdresser massaging
his client's neck and she hoped that
her female hairdresser would massage her
in the same way,
but then her wish came true and she didn't like it.

"It didn't feel sexy. It just felt like
I wished she'd hurry up and cut my hair."
And my friend turned to me,
after her confession,
I could tell half-expecting me to come out to her,
or at the very least,
to make up a similar story to validate my sexuality.
But I didn't. I just kept chewing my toast,
and then, I think, I wondered aloud
if it might taste better
with real butter instead of margarine.

And then a few years later
a real-live, honest-to-god, out-of-the-closet lesbian
asked me if I'd be her nude model and I said yes
and I did it
and then asked me to sleep with her and I said yes
and I did it
and then asked me to go on a date with her and I said yes
and I did it.

Still, I had to borrow my roommate's go-to sage gay male friend
because while I picked out which dress to wear,
I kept saying, "But I'm not gay. What am I doing? I'm not really gay."
And he handed me a yellow sundress and pulled me together,
saying, "Decide if you like her first; decide if you're gay later.
You can figure out the rest from there."
So I did it, and I came back smiling,
thinking that she'd talked a lot but maybe that was a good thing,
thinking that maybe she thought that I didn't talk enough, slightly worried.
When he asked, "Did you like her?"
I said,"Yes."

And then she was there and she was a part of my life
and she was soft and she smelled like clean laundry
and like a little bit of sweat sometimes
and she was in my bed and at my table and in my head
and she was giving me nicknames and playing with my hair
and my thoughts were all dust caught in the wind.
And I want to tell you all that I was in love.
And I want to tell you all that nothing else mattered.

But it did matter
because I never really got to that deciding if I was gay part,
and now she was lying about ex-girlfriends,
and showing up at my work, and she was getting a job there too,
and she was inviting me to meet her parents,
and she was off and on and off her pills,
and she was crying for no reason.

And I wasn't sure that I liked her,
and I wasn't sure that I was gay,
but I knew that I felt small,
small like my speck of dust thoughts
sent swirling into nothingness by her breath
and getting caught in her eye,
so small that if she shed one more tear
I was sure that she'd drown me.

And so I ran away.
I ran away to the arms of a man, to the house of a man,
where I thought I was safe, thought the the lesbians couldn't get me.
But then it was a month or two later
and I was asking myself if I really liked my boyfriend
and I couldn't figure out the answer
but it didn't matter.

Because I was asking myself if I was straight,
and the answer was, "No!"
and it sung out in the same schoolyard tone
as when I'd first been accused of liking boys,
and I could figure out the rest from there.

Y

I've been thinking, and it takes vowels to make a lesbian.

The e, and the i, and the a, but there are the implied vowel sounds, as well.

There's the u, obviously,

as in "I love you,"

as in the sentence whispered at the end of entirely too many second dates between two women,

as in "You and I should move in together,"

as in "U-HAUL."

And then of course, there's the o,

which is sometimes silent,

but which is usually very, very loud but hidden

under blankets and bed sheets and muffled by pillows,

so that it is often mistaken for silent.

If I could use only one letter to describe the ways

in which women differ from men,

I would choose the letter O.

Because when I think about women loving women I hear an ocean of Ooooohs.

And when I think about straight sex,

I think of women who want to be whole instead of o's—

women who want to be made into spheres instead of sounds,

which feels good, too;

Though I'd prefer to stay O

because to me, no O means there can be no orgasmic, no Oh, oh God,

there can be no onomatopoeia,

which is pretty much what O is, anyway.

Ooooooooooooooh.


And yet I am not quite O.

If I were a letter, I would in fact be Y

because I am A, E, I, O, U, and sometimes gay,

Usually gay, but not strictly, and so I am Y.

This is somehow fitting, given that the tiny piece of me,

a piece the size of the bit of the letter X

which must be removed in order to make the letter Y,

is quite equally proportioned to the size

of the part of me

that is stricken with desire

when an atypically attractive owner of the Y chromosome removes a layer of clothing.

And though, as a Y, I did once go though the consonant/vowel identity crisis,

insisting that I was one or the other at any given point in time,

but never both,

not possibly both,

because dual-citizenship in the world of letters

just results in constant queries from

consonant companions as to whether I'd be cool

with adding an extra letter into the mix,

turning our sex life into a three-letter word,

if you catch my drift,

or even just a two-letter word,

two vowels: you and oooooh

or maybe he would just sit that one out

or maybe he could just watch

or maybe you could just take pictures

or maybe you could just tell him about it later

in excruciating detail.

No, dual-citizenship in the alphabet world

will cause certain O's to turn up their noses.

I once found myself in a long-term U and I situation,

but when I revealed to my U

that her lady-loving O had once dabbled in the affairs of consonants,

her reaction was dramatic—

head flung back,

hands balled into fists,

mouth opened into that lovely wide O that I love so much

and she cried,

"WHYYYYYYYYYYYY?"

And I said, "Yes!"

"Yes, exactly," I told her. "Y!"

And she looked confused and she asked softly,

"But, but...why?"

And I told her, Because that's who I am,

and that's how I feel,

and I can't spell my name with just the letter O.

I need H,

that Hhhh sound,

the sound of an exhale,

the sound of the humidity of your lover's breath

heating up the back of your neck.

And I need L's

I need two L's because I like them that much

because L's taught me love

and love taught me licking

and licking taught me lesbians

and lesbians taught me more licking, more love.

And the Y is the most important letter because the Y is me.

And the Y is what gives me power to ask myself things like:

Why is it that I let him wrap his arms around me

if she's the one I see when I close my eyes?

And:

Why is it that sometimes it takes forty-five minutes

and some gentle guidance for his touch

to feel like anything at all?

And:

Why is it that she brushes my hair out of my face and the whole world slows

to the point that I swear I can feel the molecules of my skin being rearranged

beneath her fingers

and I want to bottle her touch?

And this is when I find the words that make myself understand,

And this is when I say the words that make her realize,

I say, "My O, the Y is the most important letter

because without why I could have never made it to you."

Dead Romance Language

Words once spoken in whispers,
between giggles,
shouted from car windows,
murmured at the ends of telephone conversations,
are losing all meaning.

Watching La Vie en Rose in my black robe,
sipping macchiato with two shakes of cinnamon,
dabbing my wrists with the scent of lavender and honey,
taking the streetcar to the book store in the rain,
speaking with friends who assure me you are well,
I feel like a foreigner in lands that were once home to us.

I am told that you will move to Montreal in June.
I am the only remaining speaker of the language of us,
the language of our love, and I have lost fluency.

I struggle to pronounce the most basic phrases.
"I love you,"
"Kiss me now,"
"I need you here,"
All lost to me, lost to the world,
forgotten from lack of use,
eaten up by the prevalence of a more practical tongue.

Forming my lips into that soft 'O',
required in most romance languages,
is now a bitter impossibility.
My mouth has given up trying.


My lips so rarely move
to make the syllables of your name.

The Will

When I am dead, my dearest,
fill a Dixie cup with wine for me.
Don't volunteer to hire the priest,
some stranger to recite pretty lies in my honor.
Don't go to the funeral at all.
Pull the petals off the roses
you bought to comfort my family,
put those petals in a silk bag,
save them,
use them to seduce a misty-eyed brunette
in a little black dress.
Bake your feelings into a cake,
not one from a box;
your feelings require real butter and real chocolate,
not powder and just add water.
Eat it by yourself, all in one sitting.
Eat it with your hands. Don't use a plate.
Your feelings are too messy for forks and knives and napkins.
Stay home and write bad poetry.
Buy a typewriter,
tell yourself you'll use it
to write one haiku per day,
place it on your desk,
let it gather dust,
let it take up space you could use
for something more productive
in memory of me.

Tiaras

Mag once told me that stories about two girls never have happy endings. I'd never thought about it. I wanted to argue, but I couldn't make a case.
"What about us, Mag?" I finally asked, "Aren't we happy?"
She didn't even take time to consider, just rolled her eyes. "It's not the same."
Realizing she'd hurt my feelings, Mag ruffled my hair and gave me a dismissive smile.
This took place during her tiara phase. One of her little protests against normality, against heteronormativity, against patriarchy, against the mundane and socially acceptable. Mag backed up her tiara phase with this reasoning: "How often does an out bull dyke get to wear a tiara? When I was five, my daddy called me his princess. I'm not giving that up just 'cause I've grown up, and it turns out I'm gay."
"I don't know, Mag," I ventured. "I don't think straight people get to wear crowns much, either."
Pretending she hadn't heard me, she continued her monologue: "What? Just 'cause I'm into women, they take away my crown and my happily ever after gets revoked? It's bullshit. I'm a motherfucking princess, and I'm gonna wear this tiara."

For Rico, Jack's Last Request

When I am dead, my dearest Rico, please do not attend the funeral.
Please, do not squeeze yourself into that black dress on my account.
Do not spend days agonizing over which wig to wear—the black,
pinstraight bob says mourning but the blonde Goldie Hawn looks so
good on. Please, my darling Rico, don't plaster over your eye brows
and paint new ones on your glittering brow bones. Don't go with the
gold eye shadow. Don't wear that same red lipstick that you wore the
last time that we kissed. Oh, god, Rico, and please, whatever you do,
do not make a speech. Do not mingle with my family and friends at the
memorial, and then halfway through the service, don't stand up and blurt
out some bullshit about how you were the true love of my life. Do not get
into a catfight with my wife over my casket. Do not get into a who-can-sob-
louder-and-is-therefore-more-emotionally-distressed-by-this-event-and-
therefore-loved-me-more match with my mother. Remember, Rico, you are
a lady. My lady. Do not introduce yourself to my boss as, "Coco, a very
close friend of Jack's," emphasis on the close. My darling, Rico, whatever
you do, do not have one of your episodes upon seeing my in my coffin.
Do not grab my lifeless body by the lapels and sob about how I was taken
from you too soon. Do not get on your knees in that cocktail dress. Do not
rip off your matching vintage hat—the one with the little netted veil—and
throw it across the room before balling up your fists and beating the ground
hysterically and shouting, "Whywhywhy!" Please, Rico, if you ever loved
me at all, then when I am dead, my dearest, please stay at home. Do not
change out of the silk bathrobe I bought you in Barcelona. Do not do your
makeup. Do not do your hair. Do not leave the house. Order in from Harry's.
Buy yourself two desserts. (Don't pretend you're worried about getting fat;
you always eat mine, anyway.) Drink that champagne we've been saving.
Drink it right out of the bottle. Put on Funny Girl. Watch it three times and
recite all of the words. (I won't be there to let your know how annoying
it is when you do that.) Don your fur-lined slippers in my honor. Cry if you
must, but only if you must. Take comfort in knowing that I was naked in your
arms, and everything else that I ever did was just drag, part of a persona. Get
angry that the love of your life was so artificial, if you must. Call for more
champagne. Watch Funny Girl again. Fall asleep. Wake up. Take two
aspirin with a glass of water. Pull the covers over your head. Close your
eyes. Start to feel better.

The Alphamale (or the ABC's of why I'm leaving you for a woman)

A is for asking for anal and the “accidental” slip into the wrong slot when the answer was still NO.

B is for beer pong and your Budweiser breath on my ear begging me to go bed with you, a charming “you’re beautiful,” and suave belch.

C is for cheating when we played checkers, cheating when we played chess, and cheating when you said it was love.

D is for the dozen drunk dials I awoke to when you dared to slur, “Are you suuuure you’re disease-free?”

E is for every time I envied the eternally true iloveyous of lovers lost in each other’s eyes when my own ears were only ever graced by echoes of my malcontent emotion.

F is for my favorite feud: who got too friendly with whose friends first and all the other fights over who fucked who over most; it got far too physical for me pretty fucking fast.

G is for your grotesque grease-stain glow because you think you look like a rockstar when you don’t bathe, but really you have all the glamour of the gray gravy goo my granny saves in a jar in her fridge.

H is for your hard-boiled heart and my hunger to be held by a human, maybe one made of some humble heat instead of your unholy hands at my haunches.

I is for the imperfect self-image I developed ever since you inquired if I’d ever considered implants.

J is for being jarred by your jealousy of the jocks at the gym who I’d never even talk to.

K is for keeping secret your kamikaze-style of kissing because I could never find a kind way to say that a shish-kabob could show you up in a kissing contest.

L is for the look on your lying lips when “I love you” leaked out for the first time.

M is for my mother’s well-meant advice to look for a “more well-mannered man (maybe one with money or at least morals)."

N is for never finding it necessary to nix your unruly neck-beard, no matter how many times I let you know it nauseates me.

O is for the outrageous outnumbering of your orgasms to my zer-Oh!

P is for the puke on my new purse, pulling off your piss-soaked pants before I put you into bed, and the putrid lack of apology lingering in the air the morning after.

Q is for your not-quite clever quips and the quiet that quickly follows in order to quell the pique to my pride when you speak.

R is for my resentment towards the way you never make my phone ra-ra-ringgg when you promise, “Really, I’ll call you right after work.”

S is for saying, “Let’s see a movie at seven,” stealing sixteen dollars from my wallet, and not being able to spare seven stolen bucks for my ticket.

T is for is for your Tic-Tacked tongue, the tartar-crusted teeth you never brush, how your tongue tortured my mouth like the rusty tool used to poke at a dying fire.

U is for my unfortunately under-touched undercarriage and your unappreciative utterances once you’ve used me to get off.

V is for my vain attempt to fill the void in my life with your volatility.

W is for when I washed your whites and found an out-of-place pair of women’s underwear, which you swore were mine.

X is for the X-rated stories of your exes that you are so excited to recite to me, despite my vexed protests.

Y is for your yo-yo yearning and spurning of your loved ones.

Z is for your zealous Zoloft-popping so that you no longer have to feel anything human and can go on living like the alpha males of the zoo.

The best kind touches the soul, she said.

After Mag, I stopped touching people. I stopped letting people touch me. It wasn't something that I thought about so much as it was a chronic symptom of knowing her.

I remember the first time I zipped up her dress, the first time I braided her hair, the first time she silently grabbed my face just to scrutinize my every pore. I remember our first meeting, how she snuck up behind me and placed her hand on my back, as if this was the customary way to greet strangers. I remember our feet and knees nervously touching under restaurant tables and in movie theaters. I remember her arm casually brushing against mine when we stood in line together. I remember each strand of hair, each tear, each eyelash, each bit of mascara or eyeliner, each smear of lipstick, each trace of paint or pen or frosting or foam, each miscellaneous smudge we wiped from each other's face. I remember my palms sweating when she took my hand in hers. I remember her collapsing onto the floor, sobbing at the thought of being apart, and I remember lifting her up into my lap, holding onto her and truly wishing that I never had to let go. I remember smoothing back her long, blonde hair with one hand, squeezing her cool, dry palm with the other. I remember how her skin was always just a little bit colder than mine, how on a cold day she'd pull my hands to her face or her neck or wrap them around her own to warm herself up. I remember the bruises, the bite marks, the scars—hers and mine. Mine: wine-colored, some shaped like words, some shaped like stars, precise. Hers: little gray-pink crescents, a galaxy of quarter moons in a milky white sky. I remember the first time she sunk her teeth into my shoulder, purring, "I hope you don't mind pain." I remember the first time she peeled off her jeans and t-shirt, straddled me in star-patterned underwear, told me to relax. I remember tracing her ribs with my index finger and her calling herself a "starving artist." I remember waking up in a cold sweat over reoccurring nightmares and how she'd pull me in close to her, breathing warmly into my ear. "Shhh, it's okay. You're okay. I've got you." I remember her standing in my doorway, screaming at me over things I'll never understand and how much I wanted to grab her and shake her and yell, "It's me! Don't you remember me?" I remember letting her go, letting her slam the door behind her, after she looked at me like a stranger and didn't kiss me goodbye.