11/30 Going on a Bender

11/30 Going on a Bender

I consider the boots. The way they mold to calf and step. The way they add a little extra to my stride. When I don the hat, I am careful to tilt it so it nearly covers my right eye. The glue applied carefully to my upper lip will hold the hair cut from my own head. Maybe I’ll wear a goatee today and sideburns. The corset will confuse some, but I don’t bend for them, so I don’t give a shit. I'll ignore the murmurs or maybe I won’t. The way I figure if they are talking about me, judging me their would be bully voices aren’t turning someone else’s questioning skin black and blue. There are those who care so much what others think of them they contort their spirits into people they hate. I never understood that. I have grown into my defiance. Long gone are the days when my response to people who said “You don’t look like a girl” was to pull down my pants make sure my pieces were still there. If you are going to tell me what I look like don’t be a pussy coward and stomp off when I report my vagina is still in tack. What I look like is only relevant to me. I am not your Barbie doll. I am my Barbie Doll. I own dresses, jeans, men’s suits and camisoles. I have been known wear lace, vinyl, mesh, strap ons and chaps, sometimes all at the same time. All it means is that I am different on different days. I am I the way I want to be in the moment. I am minding my business not tending to others. I do understand those who haven’t found that freedom, it makes me sad but, I understand. So, today I’ll wear the boots, the goatee and corset. I will tilt my hat, make sure my sideburns are sort of the same size and line up the pin-stripes in my men’s suit. Today I will change the gender in all of my poems. I will bend my poem, because they belong to me like my wardrobe, my opinions, and my insane sense of style. Thanking my lucky stars that my parents knew the world would try to box me up and lock me down. So they made my skin, my mind a key.