Envy and Gratitude
By the time I adapted to it, it was
almost over. I didn’t doubt it would
resume. I didn’t doubt it could
be even more intense. Do you
trust we’ll survive another year
in this cross fire between these
extreme polarities? Another day,
missing someone—loving someone,
you’re never not alone together—
you aren’t ever alone. I’m trying to
adapt to ambivalence, abandonment.
A caregiver can’t give unlimited care
but can share their care with others.
It returns you to your first frustration.
Gender Studies
What if I feel no desire
to detach from my desire?
I’m here right now because
two humans desired
and then fucked each other,
so, my being’s been compelled
by the action that created it,
as a river (I’m here again)
compelled toward more
of itself (the only ocean),
the original oneness is what
I’m seeking (I believe),
when pushing my extremities
—skin, veins, fat, muscles,
skeleton—against or inside
the other; I seek to meet
myself, to see who I have
and will become: a stranger.
But this desiring breeds
such excess. I should detach.
Gender Studies (for CK)
When reality’s too unbearable
and you regret you’ll never remember
everything you’ve learned, remember
this universe knows that it exists
only because you do. And while
these planets wheel around their sun,
I’m pulled toward you with gravity.
Here, opposite you, I’m imagining
the elimination of my individual
lineage within the extinction of
our entire species. Our deceased:
One day, no matter what,
we will turn into them; we’ll be
as unreal as they are now.
