I'm Fine! What if instead of my mind It was my leg that broke And instead of racing thoughts I just had a hacking cough? Holding my breath Shaking my head Laughing but my eyes swollen shut Now I see it all My svelte body Half moon eyes Toothless smile Through the perilous night Proved that I was still here Now I’m like sequins in the sky Laughter bursts out of my core My belly aches And it jiggles! What if instead of saying “I’m fine” My skin turned, blue, then purple, then g

How do I say my stomach is in knots? How do I say my brain is rotten? How do I say my warm, beating heart, full of insect wings, turned icy cold? How do I say: hold me. Overnight, I grew a shiny black hump. I turned into a beetle. All six feet want to run, like horses with wide eyes. All four eyes want to glance away, like a man caught doing crime. How can I say it? I can’t even say it. Stop throwing apples at me.

My father used to say: “I raised you this way.” Like Mulan in the war, I passed as a man in girl form. After a few hard years he told me,...

I standin the kitchen. On the counter I imagine a scene. I grab a sharp knife, gleaming to a point. Instead of the meat from the...