
what even r u? | Judith Wright Poetry Prize, second place
non-normative flags whip pink f*g umbrellas out of our trans- -gressive / expressive hands we’re marching / crawling / squirming on our tattoo-tanned bellies out from under the wind-whipped rainbow a man on the footpath leers at / up my swelling skirt … but in a romantic way / normative way / innocent way … (aside : i lost my innocence to this bloke branded the Gendered Healthcare System & his love of inflexible formal binaries) in truth, i’m flexible about discrimination : see also : new msg : ur a genderfree male, yeah? new msg : i get it – ur *just* a non-gendered female?! ur a general lack of person / per- -centage / reference point / pride? a flimsy foundation of cluttered pronouns & threadbare symbols? new msg : wait, r u *just* an emoji? let me try again : r u 1 of those tr*nnys? hey, i heard (on the news / on facebook / on this scrawl of foot- -path propaganda) … that ur identity lacks identity / definition / something i can cling to because : i’m shook / a sook / a sock monster wagging my tail / working myself into a state called ‘unable to show you the slightest respect’ in truth, i’m *just* fucking tired of the marching, the crawling (see also : indulging) : see also : exhausted / pooped / snoozed out of the cis-tem & sick-to-choking on ur systemic lasagna-layered revulsion let me try again :
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