I’m back in my hometown in Texas when I
received the news that Lila a
seventeen-year-old trans woman has
committed suicide by walking in front of
a truck in Ohio the article refers to
her with her birth name and gender so I
remember that rest in peace is a luxury
only afforded to bodies whose violence
ends with death I’m sitting in the
waiting room to see a chiropractor
ostensibly to diagnose the chronic back
pain I have developed this past year but
judging from all the middle-aged women
in the waiting room next to me I
remember that the chiropractor is simply
a place to be touched to go through the
ritual of allowing a man to caress you
again as if he cares you see in this
town certain acts of transgression are
permissible as long as they are covered
by health insurance or at least have a
Bible quote to justify them is there a
difference this is the past year I’ve
started to publicly identify as trans my
doctor does not know this but my mother
does though if she could use denial as a
pronoun for me she would earlier today
my grandmother tells me that young boys
like me aren’t supposed to carry so much
pain in our bodies in other words we’re
not supposed to be hurt apparently we
are only supposed to be doing the
hurting we live in a small town in Texas
which means there are crosses on every
wall the doctor’s office and Bible
verses always written in fonts like
Comic Sans and impact used completely on
ironically so I think to myself how
remarkable it is that one symbol can
mean such different things for two
people there clip art my cliche your
birth certificates our search warrants
our femininity your ridicule your
crosses my classmate Ashley who and 10th
grade tells me that it will rot in a pit
of burning sulfur if I do not embrace
Jesus Christ in my life there are a few
things the people where I’m from tend to
be right about but I think she was about
this one
signed sincerely me the flaming
from Texas
***
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