8 F Y R E ' B I R D 8

gentle bird, bring that wander-lust in.   mend and restore   what has been broken.   so many years, of broken,   many shed tears & cries of confusion war in bodies,   across centuries.  gentle, gentle, gentle bird   calm the fangs of blood  aimed at yourself rest and reflect on these stories   in your body,   and remember   to circle above   and see from there too.  all is convening   to come together   and give you a chance to put down that heavy   weight   and   move   on  

we carve mountains out of our spine because that is how the earth taught us.   the earth taught us some things.   the earth taught us about poetry, about being gentle, about being fierce.   the earth teaches us about time.   about when to express and shine   and when to be hidden and withdraw withdrawing one’s energy into oneself   and becoming darkness is sacred   our world does not remember this   our world is only fruiting and harvesting   there is no awareness of “death” in our world   i want to be an awareness for death in this world  

cooing, soft night air.   i conjure this around me.   i let my bones settle, because often in the city, they are on fire. they are running with electric tires, the nervous systems in me cars. streets and cars, hard metal that comes from somewhere, far away. distant booms, high pitched sounds. i wonder about how we can manipulate our environment with sound, and how there might be sound warfare, and how there is also: sound healing.   because so often in the city my breasts never settle. my bones have a hard time not rotting and becoming the earth, because we must return to the earth, we must return to the earth, we must become Them, we must become Her, be eaten by our chthonic desires, come home to Her, come home to Them, sparkling and dark, moonlit :earth. my bones remember. my bones remember, decay and how to become the earth again.   in winter, i smell death. death is everywhere. i feel like i let parts of my garden (genitals) die out this winte...

when i came out to my cis-het boyfriend as genderfluid, he asked me what that meant. when i explained it to him, he said: “that’s weird”.   we were driving in the car. he was driving. he quickly looked over at me afterwards, as my face, space, and whole being was impacted by the weight of his statement. horror, pain, and grief erupting through my eyes. tears beginning to rush.   needless to say, i broke up with him. it took me awhile, but that moment taught me who i wanted close to me as i transitioned (and who i didn’t want close to me). it taught me self-care, boundaries, and respect. it tacught me to see how ingrained self-erasure had become for me as a non-binary person, and how low my sense of self-worth was as a result of it. it taught me how deep the pain of many years and lifetimes and generations of erasure feels. i was crying for days after that incident. i didn’t know what was happening to me. enormous grief portals opened in my body. i didn’t have lan...

every day, write. because if you are not writing, here. you are writing somewhere. there are stories being told somewhere, in your being. they happen racing through your head or wake up at the tips of your fingers when dreaming. the ways you happen, and how the world happens with you is important, is important. write, because. it gives you life. it gives you a place to put: everything. it gives you a way to navigate death. the empty page does not judge or hurt you, like sometimes, the thoughts do inside of your own head. or the glances, shrugs, and distracted looks you interpret as signs from others, proving your unworthiness. write, because when you do, you fly. and flying tastes so good to your wings. your wings must remember how to fly, and when you are writing, they do. it is permission. it is promise. it is hope and despair and returning again to a place of origin. it is channeling, it is home-coming, it is discipline and challenge, death and resurr...