femme

like any good binary
i am my best in the dark.
sometimes a fishnet 
is all you need to be a real boy. 
often, in shadows, a bird
will briefly become a fish.
flash of scales. this is why 
all birds roost by the water.
like all binaries, i am 
sort of lying. did you know
the moon is just a reflection
of the soon on the infinite water?
lying again, or am i? i grew 
as a little boy. my face lived
on a penny until i turned it over
& became a monument. where 
do you salvage your other sides?
like a sock, my father curls up in the dark.
i peer in his bedroom door 
just in time to see him 
as an old woman knitting
endless scarves. what is the opposite
of an egg? i'm asking because
they are something else then in the cartoon.
their secret little lives as needles.
you found the light switch in my throat
& asked "what does this do?"
before, flicking it & watching me
turn into a hydrangea bush. 
i sigh, saying, "i wanted roses." 
what is more femme than 
a thorn? than a tangled mess of green?
i take you on a cobblestone road
towards an old barn where 
all the old genders go to graze.
i am the neither & the all & the always.
when i put on a wig, if bursts into 
chicken feathers. i want nothing
to do with hunger. instead i will be
hungry. if you put on what you need
like stockings it will have no choice.
opening my mouth i tell you "quick look!"
you catch a glimpse of my teeth
as blossom buds.