Gender Fears

You want a body
with which you can identify,
a soul you can expose.

You want someone to peel back
your fuchsin cherry-flesh
and hold the damp pit of you
between their teeth.

An act of war, an act of love:
it is all throwing yourself away
for recklessness, all waking up
to smoke and flames,
all existing like a live wire
about to shock the next person
with a good grip.

See, there’s the real conflict-
you want love but the moment
it raises its bloodstained
muzzle you become a deer
that flees again, that skitters
through the laurels with a lost
girl’s song in your chest.

You dream about shapeshifters
who shiver from one skin to the next,
becoming oceans, becoming
church windows, kaleidoscopes,
things that sparkle in the light
of a hundred different Sundays.

You dream about holiness,
and a lover who will kiss the chasm
between your ribs without
feeling afraid of the weight
that emptiness leaves.

By Mica K

Biography:

Mica K is a twenty year old Virginia kid who gets sentimental about constellations, sunrises, hot tea, and good poetry. They were more than likely born with a book in their hand and a poem in their mouth. They currently study English and Creative Writing at university.