tender cuts

i don’t like to be asked what my gender is anymore
like silas denver melvin says, it is usually a case of
cis people asking cis questions, which is to say you
think you’re asking me how to get under my skin
in some way or another, but honestly, it’s clear
you are really asking me how human i think i am

you’d prefer i cleanly cleave myself in thirds, one for
my dropped & frying vocal cords, thickened
by three years’ worth of pinpricked thighs & belly
the hair growing like a moss trail down my arms
& stomach & upper lip, the scalpel shaping my
rejected tissue, carving purpose into muscle at last;

one for the tender curve in at my waist, the braids
down my back, the stretch marks snaking across
my chest where fat once weighed down flesh, the
iridescent shimmer of beetle wings across my
eyelids & cherry-flavored lip gloss, my nasal
tonal lilt that lands between lesbian & twink;

& one last cut to sum up incomprehensibility,
sacrificed upon your altar plate, sliced daintily
into raw bite-size pieces for you to crush between
gnashing molars like a flank steak, blood dripping
into some grotesque rorschach test, so you people
can marvel at my pain & wonder what it really means

*

sometimes i look at her and i only see my mama

but the name slides across my tongue, bitter
as ashes, until i swallow it to avoid choking. it’s mom
now. i’m not allowed to be her baby anymore, but
it’s not her fault, not really. her arms are still open
but now i’m an ex-daughter, a son. a child too-long past
its due date. she says, i wish you held onto god, not
in the transphobic way but to say that she wishes she
could’ve left me with something that would make dying
digestible. i’m sorry, i promise, but i only pray when
i have something to prove, sitting curled into myself
like i could crawl back into some pretemporal pocket
of the universe, safe at last, sleeping with the angels.
maybe i believe in it after all. no way to know for sure
until the moment it matters most. my prayer is that we
really are made out of the same stardust. we make it out
sparkling no matter what. no trumpets, no soul-scales—
angels smolder and die like any other light we turn to. maybe
that’s a comfort all on its own, mama. don’t you think?

*

Everix Machan (he/him) is a queer, transgender, and autistic undergraduate poet from Wisconsin. His poetry is published or forthcoming in The Branches, Gyroscope, and The Rebis, among others. When not writing, he is often researching and finding excuses to perform. Most recently, you can find him reading short story collections and books on dramaturgy, or working on various tasks related to his university forensics team. He’d be quick to clarify that “forensics” refers to competitive public speaking, not crime. Sometimes there is conversational overlap.