I’m joy-filled you are interested in reading my words.
Sharing poetry (or any part of you) is a vulnerable thing (especially when it’s on the internet, where every type of viewpoint exists).
If you don’t like my work, then please don’t read it. Simply move along.

These are personal pieces, and I should mention that there are many things that may need trigger warnings:
Anxiety/depression, suicide ideation, sexual trauma and shame (and sexuality in general), other trauma, grief/death, and social justice/political issues.
Please read at your own discretion.

I write because I have to.
Beyond that, I write so that maybe one person can feel a bit more loved and a bit more like they belong.

in my body there is a swimming pool
it is my heart
the deep end is the ocean
the mermaid i pretended i was as a kid lives in the lagoon with their magical friends

and by “la goon,” i mean French for “the goon”

meaning me—hopelessly in love with too much, most of it never telling me it loves me back in language i understand
j’apprends encore toutes les langues
(i am still learning all the languages)

and i am okay with that
i am used to this heart
big and leaky and sopping
spilling itself all over the place
sloshing into everything i do, everything i touch, everyone i meet

gushing

being waters means that if i know you, you’re gonna get wet
you can take that however you please
and if you please, let me tease you a lil
let me lick and linger warm on your throat
let me make your whole body float 
put a lil ease into this stroke

let yourself swim

in the whirl, the whim, the pool, the call, the flow, the shine,
the liquid disco ball that is water in sunlight

my heart spills everywhere and so far,
it’s been all right

in the petrichor of me
i move clouds to break open the aches of rain on hungry dust
tears of the breathing earth
pain from others’ lust

commit me to a stained scent on your memory
memorize every millimeter of my thighs
when you put out
the gauge of you
waiting for my storm to come

bottle up the time we found rain
with our tongues during thunder booming
wear it all perfume-y
miss it when i’m not near
feel the whisper of it behind your ear
so you can hear
my quiet riot in silence

i am the whisper of winds weighty with water
i am, too, the release

measure my love in flood
graceful storm after decades-drought
sky surrendering its sea

buckets and buckets and buckets
and fuck it, maybe it’s busted broken fire hydrant geyser
on stubborn hot sidewalks
touching skin that wants to be needy for once

whatever it is, call it
big, leaky, sopping
too much to contain in August or always

in my swimming pool heart,
there are no lifeguards on duty
skinny dip at your own risk
what if we kissed in the deep end
and the jellyfish got jelly of our dance

as if all we were was love in slow motion

forget you’re human
become float
osmosis into ocean
what if we were weightless

the wash, the flush, the rush, the hush, the symphony of silken invisible on skin

what if we became whatever it is that turns one-time joys into “agains”
like the wind in your hair or on your buzzed head, aliveness tickling your mind,
reminding you we were all mermaids in wombs at one time

it is no wonder we are called wild to the waters
it is no wonder why i want everything about my life to be fluid and flow
it is no wonder i go to the sea, where nothing is left unsaid between it and me

we called water our home before we said it about land

gimme a kiss, a midnight sky dazzling a billion stars,
doubled by the ocean mirror in my heart,
and i’ll spill out all the seas into your hands

in case you need to hear this:
i am proud of you
and that goes for every body in the room
i may not know you, but
i know you have come so far
and i know
grief has been with you,
making mazes and dazes out of your days and nightmares of them too.
but look at how you keep dreaming.
how you keep on keeping on so boldly or quietly or however you need

life isn’t easy, and that’s coming from someone with a whole lot of privilege,
so no matter who you are, no matter where you come from,
if you’re here, or if you’ve gone on but can still hear:
i am deeply proud of you.

there is nothing more worthy to be proud of than you and how you’ve beat the odds,
no matter their size or shape they take, again and again and again to be breathing.

my pride is mountains.
it is the avalanches too.
and the pines and the aspens and their roots and all the waterfalls,
especially in Iceland where
there are more than ten thousand.

i’m proud of how you’ve dealt with your trauma, unlikely done by your own hands.
but by your own ferocious grace, i am proud of your ability to heal—each tiny step, triumphant.
sound each trumpet with every inching.

i’ve learned now that life is the hardest damned thing we’ll ever do,
and yet we are really so lucky to do it,
each breath is a birthday present
and the presence is all we’ve got
until we are one day birthed back into a great big beyond.

our stories are all different, but i know we must have that in common.

i am proud of you like you are my own child:
you are so strong, soft, vulnerable, beautifully unique, gloriously made,
saving my own life in some unknown way, gorgeous in your birthright.

you are stars and sunshine
and you’re prettier than the diamond rings around Saturn.
your specific light shines and galaxies
and the depth of your soul holds together and gravities
the universe you moonwalk into.

thank you for the gift of being born,
and how you’ve likely been reborn and reborn over and over again
in order to know who you are.

i am super duper proud of all of us for the fact that we’re all
afraid and courageous little kids looking for their footing,
and we learn to stand tall in our own ways.

we can’t all grow up to be astronauts
but we all deserve to take up space

i am proud of your voice
how it shakes and moves and invites and can stand firm in your boundaries.
how it expresses your soul.
thank you for every volume you are,
for every decibel of delight that your vocal chords play,
for every way your tongue works,
for every way your tongue works,
for every way your tongue works,
and for each instrumental interaction between you and the world,
booming your bass drum or singing your songs to the brave beat where you play composer too.

i am proud of you for losing yourself to find yourself again.
of carving your own trail,
of planting seeds along the way.
of harvesting that which nourishes you
and learning to burn and bury anything that stems from shame.
i am proud of you for any way you water yourself,
for any way you green thumb your own blooming.
you are gardening the ivy in your veins.
allow yourself to be tended to with tenderness.
please be perennial and keep enduring,
please keep continually occurring.

i am proud of you for being in your body,
maybe the one you have hated,
maybe the one that has not felt like home,
maybe the one that has been shamed or bullied or teased or worse.
i’m proud of your body for keeping you alive.
i’m proud of you for keeping you alive.
thank you your limbs, your beautiful belly, your divine thighs
and all your quirks and marks and innards and dimples,
for your gifted hands, for your perfect smile,
and the art and mosaics of your face.
thank you the things you make with your whole being.
thank you for any ways you can say thank you to your own flesh.
thank you for the poem of your silhouette
and thank you your bravery to keep belonging to the vibrant family of things.

i am proud of how much you have suffered
and still give this all your most stubborn and enthusiastic shot,
even if those levels vary day to day
how something keeps you here, maybe sometimes you think something beyond yourself.
i am proud of you for living in any smidgen of trust that says “things will be okay in the end,”
and knowing that it’s not the end until we die back into dust.
and then, when it’s finally okay, we may live on in some miraculous way.

maybe we’ll live on with our poems,
which i am so proud of you for writing or thinking or being.
for getting your truthiest truths onto the page or out to the world,
for expressing your rage or your heart aches or how needed the power of joy can be.
for giving the world bits of your soul,
slivered and silvered and gleaming and glistening in your stanzas.
i am proud of you for choosing the giving your creativity to the world
instead of saying “creativity just isn’t for me, or if it is, the world won’t want a piece”

thank you for not being afraid of your own power.
thank you for harnessing your courage.
i am proud of you for every way you are creative and brave,
by how you love or live or dress or how your make art or teach or parent or friend or
chisel away at the marble of your life, the marvel of your life,
to reveal that the masterpiece has always been within.
thank you for every way you share any and every gift you have been given.
your generosity saves the world even if you don’t know it.

i am proud of you for being both the work in progress and the masterpiece already
and i am proud of you for how you work to master peace.
how you hook and weave and paint and dream and sing and pray and draw and write your being,
how you continually tell and teach your story and all the ones that came before so you could be.

i am proud of you for being.
i am proud of you for being.
i am so proud of you for being

exactly who you are,

all chaos and glory and brilliance and guts and rough stuff and love.
and magical scientific stardust and kisses from moon rocks and miles of parts
and your deep and bleeding heart.

alive, alive, alive.

amen. amen. amen.

you are more worthy of being than there are words in every single language,
even the ones we make up to feel more at home,
even the ones we haven’t discovered yet,
even the ones that have stayed in minds
you are more worthy than all the words in all the love letters sent home sick,
or the words we ink into poetry tied up in a bow with our nerves and heartstrings.

what i am writing, what i am saying, what i am pleading for you to know,
beyond how proud i am of you,

is that

you are so dazzlingly necessary.
more necessary than i will ever know how to say…

in case you need to hear this.

the silky slip down into the delicates of a hot bath
a bed that holds and hugs me to sleep
the earn of the ache after a hard workout
the worn out of the body that took me further than i thought i’d go
how the sunlight feels on my skin after eighteen weeks of the darkest winter yet
breeze becoming dance instructor to the hair on my arms
music becoming muse to my hips, my shake, my legs, my twirl

tongue painting tongue
tongue painting body
body painting anything
sweat tickling spine
wine tickling me blush
tickling ivories or baby’s belly or your fancy

cold kissing awake to my face and alive to my heart
two dogs making their home in my arms
the soft animals of their bodies just loving what they love
the pride and joy inside knowing anythiing loves me enough to keep calling me home

sweat beading after a good sweat or good sex or crushes and rushes of adrenaline
heart beat heart beat heart beat
heart ache heart ache heart ache
healing healing healing
reaching and scratching the itch
relief of any kind
release of any mind
the high of writing a rhyme
the alive of riding tandem with time

a kiss on the lips
a kiss on the lips
a kiss on the belly, on the thighs
a kiss on the hips
a kiss on the crawl space of where shoulder meets neck
a prayer “amen”ed there

god finding me in the sky or on a walk or in a book store or in a pocket of light
or in shadows cast on a wall or in the folds and crimps of petals on every flower
and the every gasp signifying an appreciation of wonder

turning anything into wonder
turning anything into a lesson
turning anything into love

knowing what it feels like to be buzzed by booze or by blues
or by a hummingbird flirting with my head
vibrations inside me
vibrations outside of me
taking my bra off at any point of time
unbuttoning my pants
fingers in my hair after it’s been up all day
letting the stretch of all of me undo
sending my shame to the door
kicking off my shoes in summer grass
barefooted two-stepping with heaven

thanking the lucky stars a butterfly landed on me
or got close enough it may have been a possibility
feeling like i may be experiencing anything for the first time
when i feel anything like spirit move
closing my eyes on open mic night so i can really listen
to my friends recite and how their words become more alive
when i shut down my sight

the specific kind of power i feel when i write my own poetry
when i can feel the bass in the music move in my body at a show
the texture of ripe and cold mango in my mouth,
how finding the perfect bite of anything can feel holy
baptizing myself with rainwater, river water,
ocean water, bath water, my own last name

allowing myself to be born again and again until i feel most me
cracking my back so I see the face of god
inspiration that convinces me i am god in some ways,
that we all are

massages that make me cry
messages that make me cry
any thing that makes me cry because it’s likely i needed to cry

any release of the body
any kick out of the pent up
every jump for joy
every largeness of laughter
every moving through each breath,
even when they don’t feel like promises

allowing my body to be touched by anything that is beautiful
knowing it finds me beautiful back

feeling the echoing of the miraculous
giving into anything graced with love

to be held by the world
and to know what it feels like to hold bits of it too

i was told by a woman i’d never met before
that i was a witch the other day
and she didn’t mean it in a derogatory way
and i knew that before she lovingly told me

i knew she meant “there’s something…..spiritual…..about you”
before she told me too
because i’m a witch
and tend to accidentally read people’s minds sometimes

and i’ve known since i was small i suppose
connected to the “beyond” in unseeable but very knowable ways
feeling energy shifts like changes in the weather
prophetic dreams every month
day dreams that turn true within minutes or sometimes seconds
feeling “protected” by a force beyond myself

but growing up i was calling all of it coincidence
calling myself “not magic”
as if thinking it didn’t already break my heart

and maybe i’m still working on transfiguration and telekinesis
but i know i’m magic, baby
and i’m gonna let the rest of my power shine
i’m rachel waters the disco witch
and this pleasure is all mine

casting light and spells
of light and love and usually health
putting the wit in witch
and the art in heart
jump starting your celestial journey to jupiter and mars
putting fun into the funeral
when i kill it on the mic
and putting “you”
i hope
in
“do you wanna join my coven tonight?”

potions of ocean water and metallic silver and martyred butterflies
cloaked in invisible honesty and the weight of so many lives i want to try
glittering especially because of the dark
riding highs like broomsticks in murdered out skies
we chase infinity knowing it is chasing us back

red dirt and sun stone and emerald
incense and intense and immense and glimmer
old trinkets and treasures collected on shelves,
knick-knacks of stories once told by someone else
i live where the wild and wondrous things are
i count myself one of them

allured by lavender and laughter and a little bit of longing
amazed by fog and stars and haze
smoke with me
stroke this fire with me
one day we will know much about being ash
one day we will all become flame

glisten like the armor beetles wear
iridescent incognito
shimmer all sun, all stars
make wonder from nothing
give light out of reflection
create a tiny party wherever i go
apparating any way of being that makes me radiate

lunar lovers in constant constellation
molded together in molten diamond
there is timing at play for love spells to work
the universe will have its way
and even the best witches or the coolest bitches
sometimes don’t get a say

i am cauldron fire
i am magic mayhem
i’ll find the working wand in my wandering

i am spotlight
i am mood music
i am turned on for a good time with the right vibes

inking poems in phoenix tears and moonwater
incantations cursived into composition notebooks and wheat fields
conjuring magic with the ordin-a(i)ry
and light
and dark and deep
sweep you off your heart
knock you off your feet
no diving in the shallow end
we begin to kick it where mariana’s trench
throws off her coat and begins to breathe

let me spell it out for you
tinker with this tincture
i’m waters and it goes down smooth
i am sparkle and i’ll make you move
i am depth
i am poem
i am ocean
i am disco
i am water
i am spinning
i am swimming
i am glitch
i am focus
i am daydream, imagination
i’m a heaven and a hell of a creation
i’m glisten and glimmer
and dark and night
i am silver moon and its mirrored light
i burn bad blood at the stake
with every poem i write

i am rach the disco witch
here to make you feel alive
hope you think of me tonight
when you wake up drenched in 3:00am moonlight 

i’ve never been good at math
one, i’m too stubborn (and/or two, too lazy) to be good at math
for numbers make no sense to me
like i’m actually 30ish
but my soul feels forever seventeen
and how many miles we have between us is currently thousands and only .3 + .6
and once in a red math folder moon the space between us doesn’t exist

the scales balance between wishing i had never met you
and wanting to keep meeting you over and over again until we get it right
90 degrees

but this poem isn’t about you tonight
it’s about numbers

so 1, 2, 3
i no longer trust you, don’t you see?
4, 5, 6
there’s quite a lot to be fixed.
7, 8, 9
you made me waste my time
10, 11, 12, and lucky number 13
again, this poem isn’t gonna be about how you hurt me

i tried to calculate,
but even my calculator doesn’t understand
how people with more than we’d all know what to do with—how do they give so little?
and the people with the least always bring the most to the table?

and there are beyond billions of stars in the galaxy
and that is one galaxy of too many to count
and some days all of that feels
like billions less than
all the ways i am capable of feeling

i am so small and so very large
and i am no greater than or less than anything
and i am nothing and i am everything and

we all are

i am the sum and subtraction and the multiples of multitudes
i am not linear
i am not quantifiable
we are always all infinity
we are forever never zero
there’s always value to carry over

and the square root of life is squarely rooting yourself to your inner child—
the one just learning to count on one hand
braver than perfectionism and more creative than the coulds and shoulds
countless worlds were possible before this one told us how we should be

14, 15, 16
i want to be punchy without hitting mean
17, 18, 19
i’m gonna heal and love and fight for me
20, 21, 22
i’ll do all this and more and it will be regardless of you

i live in a dualitied headspace much of the time
yet think probably 14,000 thoughts every hour or maybe minute,
and i don’t think time is real for that matter
it can’t be right.
it doesn’t equate.
and we have too many people yelling at us
that we’re somehow running late
as if we aren’t all sideways eights

someone tutor me on my own brain
or graph me my emotions
try to calculate my curiosity
there will be too many commas to count

i guess i choose words because math gave me
C’s and D’s on my 1, 2’s, and 3’s,
and writing gives me every letter there could be

the only numbers i seem to see to are angel
i’ve seen 11:11 more in the last few weeks than i have in years.
i’ve made wishes every time.
i tapped out 3, roman numeral 5, 0, 7 on the calculator
and flipped it upside down
and just kept reading love love love love
until the battery died

23, 24, 25
gratitude and grace and guts to survive
26, 27, 28
poppies and pictures and peace and poetry will be my fate
29, 30, 31
trusting in universe, swimming in glitter, diving in day dreams, i’m not quite done

my math may be off, but i think about my one singular life…
and how each moment is in my prime
and how there are more people on this planet
in this state
in this city
than i’ll ever have the breath to meet
and how that makes my heart feel so much grief

and i wonder if any one of those 7.99999 billion souls are thinking the same things i am
right now
maybe over a pair of graphs or a paragraph,
under the same sky
breathing in the same gift of breath
oneness and another infinity meeting amidst miles and miles
unity without knowing it
parallel lines circling the globe
never meeting, yet always together

32, i think and wonder a lot
more than i wonder if many people do

and i think about how much math the world did to make you
how many ancestors
how many coincidences
how many wishes on stars before you made your way.
and i like to think at the end of the day
we’re all beautiful and brave
no matter our age

and i think about how
maybe someday we’ll become intersected lines
or a couple of nines
or a triangle or a circle
or maybe we’ll turn into words instead

but at any estimation or equation, regarding me and you
i know you think and wonder about all of this life, the meaning of it all.
i do.
and we may never know the answer, but here’s one thing i know to be true:
i’m so grateful the universe solved all those problems to bring you here
you immaculate, mathy, infinite, you.

i was born in a church pew. basically.
i’m surprised my first bath wasn’t actually in a baptismal font.
growing up, i thought i wanted to name my firstborn “Theo”
after “theology”

my parents are or have been pastors
my grandma is ordained
the blood of christ runneth deep in my family

religion was our heartbeat
and love was always the center of that religion
still is

i am lucky in that way

fun fact: if you rearrange the letters in the word “Presbyterians”
you can spell out “Britney Spears”

and yeah I learned that at church camp
(and i also take that as some proof that god isn’t entirely straight
and/or at least has an excellent sense of humor)

i grew up in a small town
with enough churches to hold everyone
and all the cows
and all the dogs
and all the guns which we know have more rights than people

and in that small town,
it seemed like many of those nice folks who went to church on sundays
were not every other day of the week, with a small pause on wednesday evenings
or during choir practice,
and then they went back to being hateful outside of that.

and you know in a small town,
talk gets around
and these were my most formative years

and all i knew is that a majority of the town
hated anyone “different” than them
and if they didn’t, they were quiet about it.
and silence there is never helpful

and by different,
you know,
I mean not white,
or not straight,
or not christian,
or not mentally “well”
even though everyone is traumatized in some way or another

many members of those churches
thought that they were being holy,
but they were actually giving

ass-hole-y

and so i kind of made up my own religion,
and i’d like to share it with you
i’m not trying to convert you,
but you’re welcome if you’d like.
the doors are always open
and the doors are everywhere if you want to look for them.

my religion is:
those moments when i feel infinite,
wholly alive. nearly divine.
and my religion is speaking my truths
into a microphone on open mic or poetry nights.

my religion is where i hear god beyond the sound or silence.
and where god is anything i want them to be.
and my religion is making sure you know that calling god “them” was intentional.

my god is gender-nonconforming i think.
maybe god is a mother.
i think god can play the role of a parent and hopefully a friend.
i have definitely considered god my enemy before.

i wonder if a father would have the capacity
to carve mountains
without doing so from his own ego?

really i just…i just wonder if some alpha male sky daddy
that predominantly white christianity worships
has the capacity to create a thousand billion universes

i can only fathom love doing that
or science beyond my understanding
or one hell of an artist
all of those are my god

here is what i like to believe:
my god is the queer and the questioning and the support and the many et ceteras.
my god is always always always love.
my god is the midnight blue midnight sky
and the peach sunrise
and the dawn
and nebulas
and the dazzle of the big dipper
and all the planets
and all creatures created
and my god is the light and dark
and all of the colorful in-betweens
and my god is in every space,
every galaxy,
every inch of you and me

sometimes, my god is just knowing
that we are all miles of parts and trying
and guts and grit and miracles and stardust
and how magical and brave that is
sometimes my god is choosing to believe in magic.

maybe that’s the point.

maybe looking at aliveness as magic is the point.

sometimes my god is not knowing the point and trying to trust anyway.

my religion is:
the mightiness of love,
or learning to give love a loving shot.
and it is healing in the ways i know how,
which is to pay attention and ask questions and give thanks.

it is spirituality, it is art
my religion is seeking joy, finding wonder
it is communioning in the moonlight,
praying to fire,
baptizing myself any time water touches me
it is leaning into the Great Perhaps

as it goes

my prayers are silent and sobbing tears
and the poems i write
and my prayers are gratitude
and astonishment and talking in my head at night
and meditation and artist dates
and letting curiosity lead
and thinking about little me
and trying to give them what they need

my prayers are to god
or universe or
source
or love
or whatever they may be

and my church is in my bed,
and my head,
and in the neck of a lover,
in a coffee shop,
in a field,
in any and every sea.
in my mom’s garden
or with my step dad by the river, fly-fishing, catch-and-release
his own church.

and my church is in the arms of my dad
and in his excitement every time he sees me
and i have worshipped and will continue to
the sound of my brother’s laughter and his beautiful ways of being

my church is my body
and in the forgiveness i give myself every day,
a small tithe for all the years i spent hating this temple.
my sanctuary is my soul.
my church is in the sunshine and the storms.
and i can hear the choir hallelujahing during thunder blooming.
and i think god must also be lightning and therefore their love must be electric
and i think my eclectic heart has been resurrected
in the secret shared space between a kiss or in the breaths between screams
and in the pain and healing that inevitably needs to happen because all of this…

this…
is all a lot.

maybe that’s why i still need god.
maybe i want god.
my church is built on a foundation that the best is yet to come,
put together by the hands of drag queens, stilettos as hammers.
and by the “weird” kids being picked on at recess–their strength holds together the steeple.

the doors are pieced together by stained glass and by burned bits of buildings
that blazed due to the rage that another Black person
has been killed on their own streets or in their own home or killed at all

i often doubt that my church is in America.

but i’m positive that heaven is full of trans kids
who thought their lives on earth were worse than hell.
they have always been angels. 

my church was built by the wings of the sparrows and butterflies
and larks and bumblebees–all of them together and they can lift anything.
and by the ladders of limitlessness
of people who do not play to a specific gender,
and it is drilled together by the nurturing and life-giving hands
of women, and backed by men who realize they wouldn’t exist
without a woman.

and it is secured by ivy and trumpet vine and
wild blackberries weaving the wood together.
if we are kind to it, nature will keep holding us.
the forest has always given so much to my church.
my god planted every kind of tree and welcomes every kind of bird.

and each beam of my church is painted by the rainbow
and the walls are colored by every spectrum.
the huge sky lights are just mirrors of our collective bright.
and there are lots of disco balls everywhere
because we are in love with the shine.

and everything,
everything,
is hand-painted by people who need art to survive…
it is put together by softness and boldness and family wounds and hard lessons and growing tall
and is bricked together with the sturdy of righteous anger, grief, questioning, and joy and pain and
healing and breaking and survival and repairing trauma

and mostly
and always
it is built
and surrounded by
and attended to

with so much love.

always love.
forever and ever.
amen.

I grew up sheltered, super-churchified, and loved.
I don’t remember a conversation about sex or my changing body or anything of the sort.
I guess I had to figure all that out on my own.
I became a teacher to myself when I was clueless,
needed to be a student,
and was given no tools, and no where to begins.

So when I “began being a woman”
I literally thought i was dying

Home alone, woke up late.
12 years old. christmas break.
stomach ached.
bathroom break.
bright red screaming at me: “HEY!!!!!!”

My mind said
I GUESS I DEVELOPED INTERNAL BLEEDING IN MY SLEEP AND NOW I AM GOING TO DIE ALONE IN THIS BATHROOM.

It took me a few minutes too long to realize what was happening
in tears, I called my mom
could hardly get the words out
womanhood didn’t sit right on my tongue

And it didn’t feel great to the rest of my body either!

I was 1 year into bleeding when the first girl I knew–14–got pregnant.
I could barely conceptualize sex, and now this child was having a child.
By their graduation day, 1⁄3 of the girls–sorry–women in that class had given birth.

I was 3 years into bleeding when a man at least a decade older than me told me he wanted to kiss me (and more).
Conveniently for him, he was my teacher.
Conveniently for him too, I never said a word because he asked me not to.
15 years later, knowing for certain I wasn’t his only prey,
and I heard through the rapevine that he’s finally locked away.

I was 10 years into bleeding when my cycle finally became regular
and I got to stop praying every month: Dear Goddess, if you’re listening, I don’t wanna have the next immaculate conception pseudo Jesus baby.
I am not ready for that attention. Please and Thank you for the consideration. I love you. Amen.

I was 15 years into bleeding before realizing that the word “menstruate” had the word “men” leading it
and that bloody pissed me off

I was a few months ago into bleeding when I found out
that withholding information regarding sex, sexuality, puberty, etc from children –
aka–my near-entire existence as a kid–
is often considered as a form of sexual abuse.

And I am today years bleeding when I’m saying look:
I wrote this poem when I could easily write books.

When I was 12, my body and nearly everyone said to me:
“You are a woman now.
your childhood is gone.
this is how you live now.
your body is on my mind now.
your body is on my mouth now.
but please don’t put your mouth or your body on anyone else’s body, or you’ll be a slut-sinner.
but also find a husband and give him lots of babies!!!!!!!
I’ll pray for you.”

The Goddess I pray to covers my “sins” and my pleasures
and my sex and my blood and my soul and my strength and my peace

and all yours too, if you need that to keep

the blood of myself covers my sheets as i sleep

Womanhood
or whatever this is
bloody or not
despite what some seem to think,
has never been,
and never will be
for the weak.

Because it’s life-giving and gorgeous
Because poems are one of a kind
Because each one seems to have its own unique mind
And body and heart and soul and eyes
Because poetry gives me hope in hard times
It gives me guts and bridges my ruts
and heals my heart to survive

Poetry needs to exist
Because we have to live through all of this
Because we’d be remiss if we didn’t string along our letters
Because sometimes our words just do it better
Because my mouth gets jumbly and stumbly and mumbly
Because poetry is the honey to my bumblebee
We wildflower our healing

Poetry needs to exist
Because it’s more than our blues; it’s every color
Because it helps to heal our wounds; it becomes our recover

Because it’s sometimes the only thing we know as true
Because it couldn’t be written without you

Poetry needs to exist
Because it lessens the desire to mangle our wrists
Because it is ours and we are it’s
Because poetry is the gift that keeps on giving
And becomes the way which we keep on living
We write so we don’t bleed
We write so you can read
our open hearts, our heavy parts,
our light and our dark and all the in betweens
We write because we want to be known
We want to be seen

Poetry needs to exist
Because sometimes people feel all alone
And if any span of words can feel like any sort of home,
then that’s a little something like feeling known.

Because feeling like we belong isn’t a constant state of being.
Because we all have our own divine ways of seeing.
Because we all have felt like the friend left behind or the love lost or actually like life’s shit.
And because poetry is always always welcoming to those who need it.

Poetry needs to exist
Because it helped saved my life
And I’m one of many, many, many
And it’s given me guts where I barely had any
Because it’s beautiful and free
It’s miraculous and wordy
|It’s pretty and holy
It’s stubborn and bold
It can be near everything, truth be told.

But mostly poetry needs to exist
because lines on a page written in some sing-songy way
isn’t the only thing that I think is poetry at the end of the day.

Poetry needs to exist because
We are poems. Wouldn’t you say?
You and me–born and alive in whatever miraculous ways.
Carving our path all dazzling and brave.
Making stanzas of our lives,
making more than love to the page

Words are nice and important,
but they don’t exist
if writers and poets choose to kiss the abyss

And so this poem is about “poetry” and how it needs to stay here
But also this poem isn’t about words at all, wouldn’t you say, dear?

i didn’t know it for way too long
but i was raised racist
never expressed outwardly–always internally–but that is still racist!

i learned it from many many people in my small hometown.
they were…proud it was a known sundown.
making clowns of themselves, thinking they wore white gold diamond crowns
on their perfectly learned and well-read head.
instead of being that damned horse being led…
to nowhere.

but as they say; you live and you learn
and you unlearn and you relearn

and i had a lotta living to do outside of that bubble, that hub of trouble.
and i had to undo a ton of what i had known as  “the truth.”

and here is a big chunk of it: the people at the top of this country
benefit from the keeping of people of color down
and our history books seem to white that out.

They keep them struggling, suffering, juggling, muffled by the voices of those with lighter skin.
Heads amused by abuse and power, the time is now for all white people to cower
because it’s only those with darker skin who are going to break into your home or kill your kin,
not those at the top of the ivory tower or white supremacists who deem Hate as their only friend.

And so, I started asking honest questions, starting finding real answers
considered cancer of all hatred,
bantered with my loving nature.

I was burning all the backwards shit I was taught—especially the thought that all white men are nice and harmless.
Beyond their charm, if they’re lucky enough to have it,
is animal. not farm. not snuggly.
dangerous. ugly.
a brainwashed rat with fleas with white power as a disease.
get this infestation, this plague, this invitation to hatred, off these streets.

Though i won’t ever be able to take a walk in their shoes,
I’ve seen what cops or “good church people” do to people with melinated skin,
I’ve heard the hatred uttered from the “mouths of babes” and “patron saints”
and those old people who automatically think they deserve respect and grace
simply for the fact that they have aged.

i live in a world where confederate flags fly
where people have died if they’re in the wrong skin at the white time
where boomers say “no comment” when asked if they wished there was still slavery

this isn’t about bravery—undoing racism.
it’s simple.
it’s love.
it’s humanity.
dig with me into dignity.
betray your own bigotry.
fuck your fear.
blame your hatred on the nation, that’s fine.
it’s time.
memorize this symphony saying: i’ve had it with your ignorance and idiocy.

and for the yayhoos who say racism isn’t a thing because “slavery ended”: shut the fuck up

racism definitely still exists,
because that’s america, baby.
the land of the free. the home of the brave.
white as stars and white is right, and that’s clear as day.
god, or love, or poetry or whatever, damn,
please help the racist USA.

this is an ode to
waking up on a new day and being grateful instead of saying “not again”
looking in the mirror and choosing kindness in your thoughts
divorcing your self deprecation
listening to your body when it says:
heal, rest, play, create, write, sing, do, be whatever you are

this is an ode to
the first suicidal thought that feels bizarre
because they have become less frequent,
and then they nearly disappeared all together
the first rejection letter because at least you tried
the first acceptance letter because you didn’t give up
looking at the sky instead of your phone when you’re outside
looking at nature and knowing yourself as a vital part of it
telling the world, in any which way, what makes you beautiful and brave

this is an ode to
making any piece of art, acting as producer in any moment of joy
the first utterance of thanks for learned lessons
after a blindsiding that broke your heart
choosing aliveness, your own curiosity, at any turn
turning down the volume of your shame
writing any sentence of your story where you’re proud to be author

this is an ode to
doing something badly
doing something wonderfully
giving yourself more grace than you think you need
when someone you haven’t seen in years tells you “you look really happy”
forgiving your own hatred and exchanging it for a different mindset

this is a ode to
every time you make someone laugh
every time you make your own self laugh
every time you make someone feel less alone
every time you make yourself feel less alone
learning to genuinely enjoy your own company

this is an ode to
the first time you speak your truth into a microphone or anywhere in the world
any time you speak your truth to anything
the first time someone calls you by the new change of your pronouns
when someone celebrates your queerness even if it is new or “unseen” to them
when you celebrate your queerness even if it is new (and may always feel new) to you
celebrating any bit of yourself that was once bullied or blamed
or broken or shamed and the first internalization that every one of your bullies
disliked themselves more then they ever disliked you

this is an ode to
saying thank you to your body for what it does instead of judging harshly what it looks like
knowing your body is good for whatever way it looks like
for turning up the music when a song comes on that used to make your stomach hurt
when you learn that the random stomach pains you experience usually come from anxious thoughts
in the first place and that you maybe aren’t actually dying right in this moment

this is an ode to
when something you planted grows
when something you love grows
when the love you give yourself grows
when you go to sleep at night grateful, emphasis on the full.

And this is an ode to
when you wake up in the morning,
when you wake up in the morning
when you wake up in the morning
and you decide to write a gratitude poem
instead of daydreaming about ways to abruptly end your life

hallelujah for the small wins

never small enough
to not be celebrated like each one is a homecoming

written for Simplicity Church

Hope is the daring, loving sister to the cynic.
Cynic says: “I’m sad” and “me, me, me, me–
let me live my life, let me fill it with greed.
the world becomes better when criticism becomes feed,
when cynicism becomes the foundation of all which we bleed.”

Hope writes a letter penned with her love, “Dear Cynic–don’t you see?
even though it hurts, it’s beautiful, it’s amazing, and looking up at the sky is free
This world and this life is more to hold onto than not.
Please come visit me more–I miss you a lot.”

Cynicism gets that loving letter from hope and throws it away
“I’m tired of hearing from my sister and today sucks anyway 
there is nothing to be grateful for and no one loves me, I’m afraid  
I guess i’ll go facebook fight someone to feel something like brave 
and then will go feed my despair which says “I’m alone in this and it will stay that way”

The letter from Hope is thrown off the cliff–the one separating her from brother
it falls into the river and is washed away,
but Hope wrote so Cynic didn’t have to feel like “other”
it washed up to the shore of Hope’s front porch
and Hope was suddenly aware
that the letter didn’t do it—
Cynicism was still going through it–
and Hope needed to do something with a bit more dare.

Hope picks up a hammer, and her nails which are joy and rope and a prayer and her faith
She goes to the ledge between her and her brother and begins to build a bridge, plank by plank.
on the edge between Hope and Cynicism, a love letter is created, a piece of art to be walked by all.
Hope constructed a space to be a safe and loving place to prove to Cynicism he would never fall
A place for them both to be together
Hope thought there’d be nothing better.
and the space would be welcome to all.

Hope, piece by piece, built a bridge, all love  and ivy and hard work
and makes her way, finally, across to her kin, all full heart and joy and smirk
she knocks on the door, Cynic answers. Hope says “may I come in?”
And Cynic says “I’d rather you not–i’m not sure what you’ll do to me or my home, and I don’t want to begin”
Hope says “that’s fair, then will you come outside so I can show you a little thing?
Please don’t worry–it could only become the beginning of everything.”

Cynicism comes out of the house slowly, afraid of what the outside would do
unsure of what was real to him and what could also be true
as if always aware of hate and of destruction;
the opposite of Hope’s inclusion and construction
but Hope grabs his hand, and he suddenly feels more brave
they both walk together, in a bold and holy way–
both leaning on each other a little bit for stability–
both needing each other like heart and lungs–both needing each others abilities

They went to the bridge that Hope had built with her smile and sweat and tears
and the balance was there between them for the first time in many years
They embraced, they swung and laughed
Hope cried first, and Cynicism wiped her tears
Cynicism couldn’t believe he had lived his life through the veil of being ruled by his fears.

Then Cynicism started laughing and said “I can’t believe I hadn’t seen this yet—
it just feels like destruction or hate or doom or selfishness were the only things on which I could bet.”
and Cynicism pointed to the sky, as if it was the first time
he had ever seen a sunset.
As if it was the first time he realized what it meant to for him to be alive
and it was the first time he had fire in his eyes
and those were things he didn’t want to forget.

Hope said “it’s like this every day.
it’s dazzling, it’s splendorous, it’s life-giving, and it’s here to stay.
It’s beautiful out here. we just have to notice it and be grateful for it–not everything is horrible, you know?”
and Cynicism said “i’m learning that now–thank you for building this space for me to grow.”
Hope said “my pleasure, and just so you know, you’ve taught me a lot too.
You’re right–this life isn’t all sunshine and ease–sometimes things bring you to your knees…which is why I so desperately cling to trying to hold onto every tiny thing that brings me hope that I see”

She grabs his hand again and they continued, side by side, to swing
on the bridge built by Hope with love and faith and golden rope
for her beloved brother and her

between

their own lives and their own homes and their own ways of seeing
but together, on that bridge, they found, became their favorite way of being.

i am a poet
and i struggle to find words
deep or wide or heavy enough to mirror these emotions
when so much is still beyond my own understanding
and it feels not nearly enough to write or speak
when words can’t block bullets
can’t save bloodied bodies
can’t un-explode bombs
can’t bring back the dead
but i know my silence shows up looking like it supports war
and if i really know of only one thing–

may it be love

my grief is ocean
sorrows and silent prayers drowning my mind
whole heart tectonic plates breaking
for the people of Palestine

i’d move my waters to empty over
the bomb fire
the gun fire
the people on fire
i’d move the world to stop
the bodies burning
the children buried
the children bombed
the families dead
the people dead

but i can’t

so they’ll stay fire and burning and buried and bombed
and dead
and dead
and dead
until they get the only fire that matters:
cease

(and the dead will stay dead)

no justice, no peace
know justice, know peace

but what about when it’s overseas?

and genocide is happening despite millions of pleas
and your own government is funding billions
for killin children 
and their parents
trying to shield them
from bombs and bullets and blood

what about then?
does justice exist?
has it ever?
has it ever?
has it ever?
not in a world that is eye for an eye
while it plucks them from the innocent and blind

how do you justify taking a life?
taking 12000 and counting lives
most of them of kids who didn’t get to know what they’d be when they grew up
their mothers dying to give them any chance 

and over here, we think missiles and murder makes a grown-up
spending billions on a war makes a man
you suck my dick, i’ll lick your boots
you good with killing, i’ll shoot and shoot

calling ourselves strong, just, right, proud
we’ll tell ourselves any lie aloud
as long as it boosts our ego, 
not quite as small and fragile as the children killed in Gaza

dead while we breathe free

–we should know by now that the price for freedom is way too much blood
–i feel that any drop of blood is way too much
–i feel alone in that feeling way too often

our leaders are scared kids with trigger-happy hands
but they are not innocent
and it’s hard to hear that
that doesn’t really matter
over the ka-ching ka-ching
and the ka-boom ka-boom
and the dirty rat-a-tat-tat
of the murder machines

the world keeps telling me the only thing it cares about is power
and it feels like all i can offer are poems
i’ve got blood on my hands that wasn’t there on october 6th

i’ve been in love before
i think
i mean, according to the internet and books i have
and it left me speechless and gasping and kind of blinded by everything
it made me feel everything

i have been heartbroken
most definitely
and i didn’t have to consult google or a book to figure that one out

and in the present,
i am heartbroken
very, in fact
but it’s not broken enough to never be healed

even if the process is slow
i’ll bandage my love and trust in silk and prayer beads and dandelions strung together
i’ll keep making the wishes too

a fun fact about me is that for every birthday cake or 11:11 or shooting star i’ve ever wished on
since i was turning 9 years old—i’ve always closed my eyes and wished for “more love”

but that’s all for a different poem

i like to think
and sometimes i know for sure
that i’ve also learned
how to love
at least better than i did

i know it’s a verb
and i know it’s a story

but speaking its changing languages requires upkeep
and continuation to get even close to fluent
and sometimes the study gets lost
and sometimes i don’t wanna talk

i’ve known what it feels like to lose love
and to throw it away
i’ve known what it feels like to be the love thrown away
and i am not sure
which one hurts more

the truth about love i’ve found
is that it can be stinging and singing
and it is also honey
and it heals

and it’s poppies and lilac and queen anne’s lace and bluebonnets and tulips
and i will never stop wishing myself to be the springtime i hope it lands on
call me a romantic, a beekeeper,
call me a gardener, a lover

the truth about love
is that sometimes
we can’t even recognize
we have it
when we do
or when we know we have it
maybe for the first real time
we think we aren’t deserving
or some complete and utter bull shit like that
and because we think like that
we distance ourselves from it until it is
no longer close

this thing we yearn for

it is further than ever before
because that’s what we are used to
that is what makes us comfortable
and we forget that that is sabotage

not the love we claim we want

but i don’t want love

to be distant.

i want to breathe it
i want it to become who i am
and—what makes us comfortable sometimes actually really really sucks for us
and if anything, i’d risk being uncomfortable and if that meant being swallowed up by love

i think it’s worth being out of sorts for—

the unravel, the stitching, the letting go of the pent up, the ache, the want,
the need, the longing, the figuring out, the having to trust, the problem solving, the relying.
to be known and loved fully just as we are—there is no softer place to land

i hope we are all lucky enough some day to know what that feels like
i hope we are all lucky enough to rest there

the truth about love is
that it is the only thing
the only thing
the only thing
worth doing anything for

love of self or partner
love of family
love of child
love of neighbor, neighborhood
love of city or country
love of planet
love of the millions of tiny mighty miracles weaving us all together

and so

even when love is confusing or hurts worse than hell—
or maybe those descriptors are just the distance from it—
i know it’s still the only thing worth living for

and i accept the growing pains as expansion of my heart

i will always welcome love in
give it a kiss on the cheek
embrace it
let it hug me back good
(despite me being kinda weird with a lot of physical touch)

but i will give into it fully
and we’ll be together
until

the end

I pledge allegiance to the flag,
a literal piece of cloth
and to the republicans for which,
personally?,  too many people stand,
one divided nation,
under god,
if god hates others,
with liberty and justice for all
who are rich and white

I pledge allegiance to the flag,
a symbol of a broken nation
with an astounding ego
and to the Myself for which i stand,
no neighbors or others are as important as me
one nation, that sucks,
under god, who loves everyone and who is probably pissed off
at America for being so damn hateful
with lack of liberty and more injustices
than you can fathom for all
because our country was built like that
and money-hungry, power-driven,
powdered-donuts of pseudo-people
refuse to change it

I pledge allegiance to the flag,
even though the flag is not love
and to my greed, for which i stand,
i must have more than anyone else
and if I don’t, i’ll take my anger out on all the people around me,
maybe with guns if i feel like it
one nation, i guess?, under god, i guess??,
but also with separation of church and state
but also that depends on where you live,
with plenty of hidden porn and lusted internet titty
for men until it warps their entire realities
and real-life “you disgusting slut!” shouts by men
to anyone who resembles a woman who they can’t get…

men shout so that they can temporarily feel big and powerful over women
as we all know, women are weak and disrespectful and need to be taught that lesson

I pledge allegiance to the flag,
which in my opinion is way too close to the word fag
and for my heterosexuality for which i stand
and for which i want to shove down your throat,
one way of being, and that’s straight!!!!!!!,
under god,
but not on top!!!
with liberty and justice
for those who are good straight god-fearing christians because everyone else is gonna burn in hell!!!

I pledge allegiance to the flag, which should really get a makeover
your stripes are tired and your stars aren’t even metallic.
you should be barf-colored, with the word CLUSTERFUCK stitched on.
It wouldn’t be cute, but it would be accurate.
And for my country which is physically beautiful and internally fugly
for which I stand, but god damn, I am so tired, please let me sit,
one million inflations, under god’s free sky,
with real life lemony’s series of unfortunate events and with justin bieber for all

i pledge allegiance to the flag, which now stands for white nationalism
which should be referred to as terrorism
and if you fly it, I automatically don’t trust you, 
which is a very normal and cool and healthy reaction as a citizen of this nation,
and for your fear and the continued choice of not educating yourself,
i’ll never stand.
this is supposed to be one nation, where everyone belongs,
and if you don’t like that then maybe you could leave.
i said one nation, under a loving and creative god,
who the most hateful people proclaim to follow
with liberty mutual
and calls about your car’s extended warranty for all

I pledge allegiance to the glow and whole of the moon and the planets
and the red dirt and my sweat mixed with soil.
And my soul mixed with earth.
I pledge allegiance to peace and laughter and drinks and meals shared with all the loves of my life.
I pledge allegiance to poetry and to poets
and I pledge allegiance to rooting for anyone doing the best with whatever they have,
and knowing that is everyone.

I pledge allegiance to the feeling of body on body,
breaths and muscle and curves and whispers.
consent and kisses and covers.

i pledge allegiance to my dogs, to flowers, to swimming, to infinity,
to identity, to humanity, to becoming oneself a zillion times,
to iced coffee, to colorado, to oklahoma even though i hate that bitch sometimes.

I pledge allegiance to the kids in each Oklahoma classroom,
who probably is forced to recite the pledge of allegiance,
who have Ryan Walters trying to destroy real education and truth
while education is already a low priority here.

I pledge allegiance to the sea, to feeling my emotions,
to choosing to give and do unto others as I’d like them to give and do unto me,
and knowing that i am one of those people i would love to be kind to.

I pledge allegiance to whatever or whomever god is,
and whomever or whatever my muses are,
and whomever or whatever is listening when i’m trying to say something.

I pledge allegiance to my aliveness, to the brave and beautiful beats of my heavy and healing heart.
I pledge allegiance to gratitude and glimmers and gifts the universe tells me to use and those it tells me to keep.

I pledge my allegiance to anything kind, anything and everything containing truth and goodness, and all things wrapped in love.
I hope and pray for anything or anyone not in those categories, may they fit in soon.

I don’t pledge allegiance to any flag, especially one that flies for hate.
For love, I’ll always stand.
One family, under god and the universe, with the holiest of minds in our heads and heartbeats in our chests.
All these souls in all these bodies. All of it is love.
And I’ll live and breathe working and using my words in order to help the liberty and justice
we’ve all been promised
be given in whatever small ways I am able,
and maybe even aid in some ease and joy for all because we need that

we so need that
while we live here.

That is my pledge of allegiance.