Stretch like a child playing with a rubber band, who’s never felt the snap of it gone too far. Bend like light through crystal, or waves in a magnetic field— just enough to press the edge of physics. Reach through a portal built by a mere mortal, through smoke and mirrors. Offering your hand— and your whole life, too. Peel like a hard-boiled egg, cracking and splintering, delicate but sharp. Lower your shield. Expose your soft underbelly. Reveal the golden, glimmering hope wi

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,...