Masquerade Law By Robin Gow

Let’s be honest it has never been “legal” to be this real.

Everything about the government is designed to say, “How can

I make you smaller and easier to chew.” I am the sum of all the lead

that has ever lived in my father’s blood from working in the factory.

I am the lung dust of coal diggers. The wings of blood-battered pigeons

who were forced to carry messages about death. Dear God, I am contagious.

I am the kind of queer you look at and get a little gay from.

The thing we never admit is that we can change you. I have seen

straight men look at me and crack. There is a part of their soul

that wants so badly to be a faggot. That little glittering toe nail.

Their stained glass guts. Because freedom is contagious. Is hard to catch.

Is not in the clothes or even who wears them. Is never in the gender

but in exactly how we break it. I traded my fingers in for a pack

of licorice. Cross-dressed so much I made a braid. I don’t want

to be legal. I don’t ever want to be legal because that would mean

this awful country would see me as usable. I don’t ever want

to be useful to this place. Make me useful to the deer and the transexuals.

ABOUT:

Robin Gow (it/fae/he & él y elle) is a poet and witch from rural Pennsylvania. It is the author of several poetry, Middle Grade, and Young Adult books. It works as a community educator on topics of LGBTQIA2+ and disability justice.

EDITOR'S SONG PAIRING: NI Connected --- Contagious Freedom