National
Coming
Out Day
a thing i did
so long long
long ago, and
still do to this
day
because, to be
in a heteronormative
cis-hierarchical society
means, if you don’t
conform fully, you
must explain yourself
constantly
constantly
constantly
i no longer *have* to be anywhere
on april fools day
if it lands on a week-day
and for this, i am grateful
my school-years were filled with
mondays/tuesdays/wed/thurs/fridays
of april 1
and constant
constant
anxiety
it’s not even like i had a prank-gone-wrong
or anything mean like that
happen to me
directly
but i grew up in the age of
disney channel originals
and nickelodeon tv shows
and candid camera
and that one ashton kutcher reality thing
and just by virtue of being aware
of terrible
horrible
pranks
gave me a perpetual panic edge
every april first
[yes, just living in a society
with no personal experience
can change one’s
perception
of everything]
[there’s an implication here for something more,
societally,
but i’d rather spend this foolish day
chilling
and gathering
calmness around me]
the same imagination
that skews to
worst-case scenarios
and all the dire ways
we could all be fucked
in this society of ours
is the same one that shows me
there’s more to life than just
consumption
and
competition,
that encourages me to find
better solutions to terrible problems,
that proves to me
there are better
more equitable
more humane
societies
than this…
every coin
has two sides
this sword
has both edges
black must stand out amongst white
and we all know yin
and yang
aren’t balanced
if they’re not
together
[but sometimes i wish
this imagination would just
let me rest]
it’s only hitting me now
we are in a brand new year
the possibilities only end with your
[and society’s]
imagination(s)
and even then
some folks push the boundaries
of societal borderings
think outside the box
and only become trapped when they exhaust
every [im]possible way out
and still
try
i’d like to be that kind of
creative
the Japanese art
of kintsugi
is rooted in the philosophy
that just because something breaks
that does not mean it can no longer be beautiful
nor does the beauty depend at all on
covering up the fact that the brokenness happened
sometimes the cracks can be the most beautiful part
[because it shows a history—
a story]
why can’t we as a society hold that same philosophy
for humans?
why can’t i
hold that same space i have for our golden-flecked coffee mug
for my own self?
stop
stop doom scrolling
stop distraction scrolling
do something actually good for your mental health
or do something to stop this country’s imminent collapse
(or something to help your kind survive it—
seeds and love
not guns and guns)
i keep pondering early in this
panini
when i wrote and wrote
pages upon pages
freehand
freeverse
free of other older morning page expectations
and i wondered what the world would be like
‘post’
pandemic…
and i felt it,
at the very core of my being
that we’d
‘go back to normal’
before it was really,
truly,
clear
to do so,
and that the ‘normal’
we were heading back towards
had the potential to change,
to be a ‘normal’ benefitting more people
than the normal
benefitting a very
very
very
tiny
percentage,
but i felt it,
that it wouldn’t change
we “couldn’t” change
we wouldn’t change.
and lo and behold
all my strife
from mid-march 2020
to april, may, june, july 2020
most of that has come to fruition:
we aren’t ready,
people are still catching
ventilizing
dying
and half the population is still
pretending
this virus
doesn’t exist.
and of course
we’re going
‘back to the grind’
as if that’s a good thing,
as if it’s strength
or a moral righteousness
that gets you through
(rather than random genetics
and generational privileges
and a system set up to benefit
the few)
and as if
this ‘grind’
is our entire culture
(i mean, at this point, it is,
but that doesn’t make it
good
or right)
and i wish i had something better to say
than ‘i saw this coming’
i mean, i’m sure folks more versed in
infectious disease
and sociology
and economy
and the ‘why’s’ of all this
also saw this coming…
i guess i just wish
i’d had more time
to live in a world of hope
than i actually got.
i’m so nervous
about today
a new circus place
another chance to move my body
(how does my body move now?
now that i’ve had months and months off from any apparatus,
now that i’ve had over a year away from consistent, daily training,
now that the virus has changed every thing we do
now that the virus has not infected me, but the fear of humanity
constantly
doing wrong
that has infected me,
and i have symptoms daily:
a brain fog of unknowns of who may be smart
and who may be stupid,
tightness in the chest from seeing
that some
would rather sacrifice
[eugenicize]
the weak/old/disabled
as if they’re barely even numbers
(instead of whole human people),
the headache of suspicion that
there is a way to do this correctly
and our country/community/society
just
hasn’t,
the nausea
from knowing
that those in charge
worship money
before any worker
and that they think of people as pawns
to gather them more hoards of money
than they can do anything with in one lifetime,
and, of course, the whole body aches
of observing
the elected officials
i helped put into office
not being held accountable,
i want to hold them accountable,
but they aren’t even listening to those
more outspoken
more knowledgable
more persuasive in their passions
than i’ll ever be
so i’m left
with this
covid despair
this pandemic of existentialism
this disease of caring so much
that you circle all the way around
and start to care
not at all)
(but you do,
you know you do,
you’ve just numbed
the symptoms,
the disease is still
there.)
who cleans the cleaners
and who helps the helpers
who finds the finders
and who paints the painters
this is why community is important,
because if everyone stays in their place
(hah, take that, grammar!)
is the only one of their kind
then when they need
what they provide
instead of turning to someone who doesn’t know
they can turn in to their own community
and say
“i need what i give”
and they know
the next time
the other person needs it
they will provide.
(Jacks and Jills and Jax[es] of all trades are imperative to a functioning society)
kipventures 