blackbirds in my lungs.

for a while it felt like. what's the point anyway. everything i write is going to get scraped by some LLM or the other. i built this blog using the name of a girl who doesn't exist anymore. a lot of who i was and what i felt was my reality has changed drastically. it's strange how moving out of your parents' house and getting access to HRT and medical transition can completely change the shape of everything you think you know. i spent years feeling like there was a stormcloud over my head, and sometimes i still do, but things are better overall. so much better.

i don’t think i can be anyone’s girlfriend, but i want to be yours. is that weird? i want to know what it feels like. curled up against you in the backseat of your car. the romantic pulse i feel for you beats low & smooth, easy under the flesh-and-meat of my body and all the other things that are encompassed by being a human. the hum of a future i never believed in, the dreams i never thought i’d get to have in real life. more than anything i want to smoke cigarettes with you at a bus stop. i want to make you tea and watch you smile as you sip it. i want to watch you do your makeup until your routines are so familiar to me that i could do it for you. not that i’d ever be that brave; you can bet my hands would shake so much i’d only ever smudge your mascara and wing your eyeliner wrong. what i’m trying to say is, romance, real and true romance, is fleeting for me. comes and goes like a bullet train. but you? i’ve always been in love with you, just a little. under the surface where it doesn’t hurt. like the ocean, always there but so far from me. if i walked into the centre of it, it would swallow me whole. i don’t mind as much as you would expect me to. 

non-poemmic updates from a coffin far away from you

it’s winter in november and my hands are feeling like the monsoon. i listen to “longview” by green day, watch as the power dims out. you’re somewhere else, and everyone i love is far enough away from me that it’s like being underwater. i am alone, and it’s an almond in the pit of my mouth, flowers left by the bathroom sink, something we don’t ever talk about. it’s winter and none of my clothes are warm enough. the weather forecast calls this spell of cold irregular. all i know is that my city has a secret. i go out, once, for unavoidable business, and i remember how much i love the feeling of it – flights of stairs, sun on my hands, talking to people. even the mask on my face can’t take away the aliveness of it. danger remains real though, like a battery that’s always five seconds way from draining out. ‘don’t write about coronavirus,’ you tell me. i stare at my computer screen, baffled. what else is there to write about? the weather’s curved down, death rates are going to curve up, but i still have internet connection, so i broadcast my anxiety like it actually matters, and go on youtube to watch videos of strangers singing.