How to eat a wedge salad

Decide to walk to the theater
by Fenway Park, because it's
nice outside, and there are sure to be
some Pokemon along the way.

Wear the frilly blue top with
the see-through ruffled shoulders you like
so much. Do your make-up, careful
to cover up the dark spot on
your lip where you burned

your mustache off with laser beams.
It feels like sunburn.

The Pokemon Go servers go down

the moment you step outside.
Take the T halfway until the servers
are back up. Catch a Spearow.

When the servers crash again, remember
to take another dose of Spiro.

Consider wearing a skirt next time.
It's summer, after all,
and you usually pass
as a cis girl now.

Enter the cool theater and buy a ticket,
trying not to think about how much
it costs or how much
your rent will be next month.

Wear your 3D glasses like a gangster.

Ghostbusters is good.

Giggle like a schoolgirl.
Scream like a grown ass lady.
Swoon like a baby dyke.

Fall a little in love
with Kate McKinnon. Then remember

that comedy sketch where she played
a British cis boy
who wanted a vagina.
Desperately try to sort out
how you feel about that.

Until she licks her proton gun.
Then decide it's probably okay.

When the movie gets out, the Pokemon Go servers
are still down, and the T is packed.

Walk two miles back home.

Think you should definitely get
a haircut with some more edge to it.
You need to cultivate your queerness
if you want to keep dating girls.

Your phone still has some battery left (and
this is very important), so you decide to stop
at a bar for dinner. Sit at the bar.

Get "ma'amed", and order a saison.

When the bartender asks for an ID, hand it
over to him, very casually,
like it's no big deal,
and go back to inspecting the food menu.

When the bartender is still looking at your ID,
with some suspicion now,
twisting it this way and that,
investigating how it diffracts light
in the sinking New England sunlight,

look up and smile softly
at him. Think, well,
it's an out-of-state ID.

Receive your ID when it's returned to you.
The bartender says nothing. Breathe out.

Mac and cheese sounds amazing, but you chose
sleep instead of your morning run today, so
a salad will have to do.

The Greek sounds good, but remember you haven't had
any protein yet today. And the Wedge has bacon.

Order the wedge salad.

When the bartender takes your order,
he says "sir."

Die a little inside.

Start questioning everything about your day.

Is my make-up off?
Are my breasts too manly?
Was everyone actually staring on the T?
Do I look like a drag queen like this?

When the wedge salad comes, there is one
thick, flaccid strip of bacon
draped over the lettuce
like a dead animal, and there is
absolutely nothing phallic about it.

Except you wonder
if it is a metaphor for the penis
tucked inside your panties.

Then the other bartender asks
"Would you like another beer, miss?"

And all is right with the world.

The feminist inside you cringes
at how reliant on male validation you've become.

The bacon isn't even very good.

But maybe you'll wear the skirt tomorrow
and watch Ghostbusters again.

(A Little) Rez NDN Dreamsong

I'm tired.

We're driving nowhere now. I feel like year
by year, I say goodbye to more and more
family who I never know I had.
My friends and lovers, cousins, brothers, sisters,
are all lined up like candles in the night,
and I'm watching them go out one by one,
and I know this is not the dream we had.
How many funerals can dot the year?
They say you're not supposed to count the stars,
since once you start, you'll never stop, and I
tried counting once and lost myself. Now I'm
afraid some stars may fall at night, and so
I hold on tight as we are gunning through
the desert twilight, because holding on
is all that we can do. Someday we will
find a way to put this all behind while
still saying "I love you," "I love you", and
keeping everyone safe inside our hearts.

- "(A Little) Rez NDN Dreaming"

To Philando Castile.
To Alton Sterling.

To Edward Sotomayer, Jr.,
Stanley Almodovar III,
Luis Omar Ocasio-Capo,
Juan Ramon Guerrero,
and everyone at Pulse that night.

To Mercedes Successful.
To Reecey Walker.
To Keyonna Blakeney.
To Shante Thompson.
To Kourtney Yochum.
To Maya Young.
To Monica Loera.
To Jasmine Sierra.
To Kedarie Johnson.
To Demarkis Stansberry.
To Kayden Clarke.

Love.