• Hot Girls Accept Reality
• i wish i could say
• suddenly i was pretty
• so many people wanted me
• and i couldn’t say no
• i read Napkin by Carta Monir when i was 39
• and two months later in a shaky voice
• i told my partner of 13 years
• that i was a queer woman
• i’d called myself nonbinary for a couple years before
• but i’d never thought of myself as a trans woman
• for almost all my life
• i was just a straight guy
• with a vague wish
• to have a woman’s body
• a woman’s friendships
• to be fucked feminine intense
• lovely and embattled
• your favorite girl
• i know cis lesbians
• with mirror privilege
• who flirt with their friends
• sometimes after some drinks
• it gets pretty physical
• bold fun loose shallow performative traumatized
• good clean fun
• while they treat me
• with a polite
• and careful distance
• i say hello
• and nobody says anything
• i’ve found it necessary
• to fall in love with myself
• i love my sad sweet eyes
• wavy hair wit and talent
• my determination to understand people
• and myself
• i’m warmed by the heat of my isolation
• cis people tell me about this week’s bad dates
• more than i’ve had in a year
• they throw up their hands and say
• i don’t know what i want!
• or wanting to be helpful they ask me
• what’s your type?
• who’s your dream girl?
• as if i had their choices
• strangers check them out on the street
• one could almost argue dating is a social justice issue
• i keep working towards it
• trying on and taking off
• bras clothes makeup shoes
• voice training
• anal training
• media training
• readying myself for the moments
• when i will feel alive and free
• beautiful vulnerable unafraid
• connected with people
• in ways i’ll always remember
• but i know the stories that woke me up to my desire
• will never be my stories
• does it matter whether we get what we want in our lives?
• or are we more enriched
• by our pursuing it?
• when i am my own dreamer
• then i am my own dream
• an old crippled animal
• limping toward home
• dying
• and unspeakably hot