seraphimadibble-blog

[seraphimadibble-blog]

My Gender Is

I am coming out as transgender. Non-binary. It isn’t past-tense. Its present and future tense. I am coming out now, I will be coming out tomorrow. I will be coming out to people Who spit the word out like an insult To strangers asking why I’m in a skirt To people asking why I can’t just be “normal” What is my gender, you ask? Let me tell you

My gender isn’t Stationary. Nor am I confused I feel bound neither by the societal confines of being a man nor a woman

My gender is Whatever the hell I want. I know what I want And what I want is to be happy in my body and my soul and my clothes

My gender isn’t Weewee or hoohoo Can’t you say the damn word for genitals? And if you can, what does that have to do with who I am?

My gender is Non-binary. My pronouns are they, them, their, and fuck you Fuck you if you misgender me on purpose because you’re too caught up in your own bigotry

My gender isn’t Silence. Nor will I be silent. I exist in a society that tells me I am not valid, but I am valid no matter what they say.

My gender is Screaming. Screaming out at a sudden crisis A spontaneous fear that I’m not really trans, I just like cross-dressing. A spontaneous existential crisis That I’m not non-binary, I’m a woman and am just realizing it A sudden fear That I am just wanting to be seen as “cool” or fit in with a group

My gender is Fitting in. Not pretending or trying to fit in I’ve been there and there is hell. My gender is Fitting in with a group where I finally feel at home and I don’t have to pretend That I don’t like skirts, pretty nails, and feeling a little feminine sometimes

My gender is Fuck you. It’s a middle finger to a toxic masculinity One that I hid in for twenty five years, and have spent four more shedding

It’s a middle finger to patriarchy Because what use is it if I’m not using it to oppose the very system that tells me I don’t exist I am not valid I do not deserve happiness That I should kill myself It’s an ode to me being who I am and fuck you if you say anything otherwise

My gender is the realization that love is not finite My gender is the realization that love is not scarce My gender is the realization that love is for me, for you, for everybody My gender is the realization that people deserve love, even me My gender is the realization that it is okay to be mentally ill, and to break down at the smallest thing My gender is my photography My gender is marching side by side with me My gender is hand-in-hand fighting for a better world My gender is compassionate My gender cares. My gender is non-definition My gender is non-stationary My gender is non-binary

#non-binary #nonbinary #slam poetry #poem #slam poem #poetry #LGBTQ #LGBTQ community #lgbtqia+ #personal #gender #agender

[seraphimadibble-blog]

But I've Got Unlimited Data

Walking to my car in fear

But I’ve got unlimited data.

A gay couple got stabbed last week

But I’ve got unlimited data.

I’m painfully obviously queer

But I’ve got unlimited data.

Is that man following me?

I’ve got unlimited data.

I hope I make it to my car

I’ve got unlimited data.

I’m scared to be out while hunting jobs

But I’ve got unlimited data.

Maybe the boss doesn’t like trans folk

But I’ve got unlimited data.

Suddenly I’m just not qualified

But I’ve got unlimited data.

I find myself still unemployed

But I’ve got unlimited data.

You wonder how people are so hateful

Well you’ve got unlimited data.

Freedom of religion justifies hate crime

But I’ve got unlimited data.

Someone got denied life saving surgery

But I’ve got unlimited data.

Don’t tell me you don’t recognize this country

When you’ve got unlimited data.

Google your country’s history

With your unlimited data.

Maybe we forgot Stonewall was a riot

When we’ve got unlimited data.

Is it time to organize another

Using our unlimited data?

#slam poem #poetry #slam poetry #anxiety #poem #spoken word #spokenword #safety #danger #lgbtq #violence #hate crime #job search #social justice #walking #fear

[seraphimadibble-blog]

This Moment Burns Us Alive

CW: Homophobic slur

This moment bright and violent A hug gone wrong, the fear rushing past Why do we hate? Why do we destroy? Teach people to hold things Build with your hands Build with your minds Build with your hearts Build with your beings Be you Be yourself Be nobody but your free Free to be and to fly I was not free Scared of the jocks and good old boys Scared of the crash and flames of failure School an everyday nightmare Flinging myself into the woodchipper Day after day, fag after fag Sometimes a slur must be repeated You don’t catch it fully in the face otherwise A verbal punch thrown with intent to maim I kept that abuse inside a jar The jar sits next to one labeled Passive-Aggressive Emotional abuse, real and lingering I learned from the best. My parents did the best they could with what they knew That best still leaves scars, though Fear of abandonment and failure Flinching and fleeing at the first sign of rising temper Why was a B worthy of shame?

#PTSD #past #memories #recollection #slam poem #slam poetry #poem #poetry #mental health #mental illness #mental disorder #freedom #recovery #abuse #school #metaphor

[seraphimadibble-blog]

Need to Live, No Solution

Sometimes I wake up And I’m not me The clock is hard to read, it’s not numbers Four A.M. Anxiety feeding me lies the moment I wake up I’m bombarded, under siege in my own mind I know a way to silence it But I’d hurt those I love so dearly It is a permanent solution to a semi-permanent problem It isn’t worth it I know it could be worse I know others have it worse That doesn’t make it better It’s not easier to deal with Who can I thank for this? I’m not sure, but I am sure that blame doesn’t solve it This yellow boiling emotion Frantic nibbling at my soul I need an emotional superfund for the toxic land for years Save me from the endless worry But would I be me without it? What if the only saving I need is somebody to ground and validate me? I don’t need to solve my shit I just need to learn to minimize Minimize its effects on me and others Maybe survival looks like hugs, kind words, love Maybe survival is late nights consuming words, images Slaying dragons and villains Maybe survival is me taking time for me I don’t feel a need to solve this But I do need to live with it

#slam poem #slam poetry #mental health #anxiety #poetry #poem #spoken word #spokenword #anxietydisorder

[seraphimadibble-blog]

The Valley

It's my first day on the new job

I used to teach. Today I'm doing class photos.

Little girls, daughters of the parent volunteers, run in circles around my feet.

I'm smiling but it's a facade.

Yesterday, seventeen people needlessly had their lives uprooted and destroyed.

Today people are telling me it's rude to demand gun control and infringe their rights

Fucking rude.

Today people are telling me it's they're classmates faults for not knowing of the coming hell.

There are too many poems about people being shot but we stand here again.

Every year the reaper thanks the NRA for padding their wallet.

The reaper gets paid a commission of death. They care not that some of the victims haven't known love or niceness, haven't gotten to see their graduation day or get their first job.

The politicians got their wages in private jets and personal gifts. They only pay out in meaningless thoughts and prayers while taking payment from the NRA.

We fund death and ignorance instead of saving lives. Every school shooting is our reward for complacency.

How many souls do we owe to the gun manufacturers? How many souls to the right to take lives at eight hundred fifty feet per second? How many souls to this worship of death machines while our future bleeds out in front of it's locker because we can't bring ourselves to confront the cause?

I go to work scared that something will happen and a shooter will show up.

It doesn't matter if their reason is because this school has a high Latino population or because they're just another angry white man.

Because the reaper doesn't care. They get their pay and we get our heartbreak

Either way we just lose and lose and lose

Don't give me this thoughts and prayers bullshit if you aren't willing to help solve it

#poetry #slam poem #slam poetry #poem #school shooting #guns #gun control #not again #political #angry

[seraphimadibble-blog]

That Old Specter

You are in pain, Let me help you I’ve known you a short time I feel like I’ve known you since mammoths walked I feel like your pain is my pain and the only way to relieve it Is to grieve and hurt with you You, my lover, my friend, stranger on the street who let me into your soul Let me help you shoulder that pain

Nobody can cure the holes in our souls, fill them in with dirt, right away But together, we can start. And they might still look like fresh graves in a month or in a decade But we all deserve help stamping down that dirt, or putting flowers on it Whatever grieving and help look like, we all deserve love We all deserve that light

Grieve. Let the feelings happen. It is okay. Find someone who loves you. Let them comfort you. If you feel like doing so is a burden, let me tell you, one heavy heart to another I know how hard it is to reach out I know that the shadow of depression leeches out your soul It’ll tell you that you are dragging them down It’ll help you put your hand down, it’ll breathe your voice for you, it’ll move your mouth And it’ll say, for you, “I am fine” You and I know otherwise. We aren’t okay. Fine is a liar. That old shadow hangs around every word, telling you lies Your friends don’t care You’re alone You don’t deserve help.

It’s a liar. It’s a specter convincing you that you don’t deserve niceness. You do. You deserve someone sitting next to you Standing next to you Messaging you “You are not alone” You deserve someone who listens Who cares Who is willing to help you shoulder your pain

That old specter will always be with us, taunting us Haunting us Let’s try to keep them at bay, to help each other weather their assaults Because you deserve that. You deserve someone who helps you take a break. You deserve help, and you deserve happiness.

#poetry #slam poem #spoken poem #poem #slam poetry #spoken word #depression #affirmation #love #mental health #mental disorder

[seraphimadibble-blog]

I Can’t Memorize This

I might not have memorized this poem

I might be reading it off a sheet of paper

Or a phone, even.

I’m in tenth grade. Our teacher is verbally abusive.

The girl in front of me has epilepsy. Everyone knows.

She fakes a seizure to get out of class one day during a hurricane of abuse

I start the poem, come into my parlour, I choke

Fight or flight, I’m suddenly the fly. Robert Frost. Three lines.

I forget that one, too.

I’m bad at poetry. I suck at memorization. I should fail the class.

That’s something I won’t forget.

I’m in college now, creative writing class.

It is my peer review. I’ve followed all the rules

I learned to be concise in high school.

I learned to be precise in English 101.

I learned not to aspire, not to dream, not to fly.

My poem is short, to the point, I learned to be abstract.

It is the only one that isn’t a love poem. They tear it to pieces.

I learn that I’m even worse at following the rules than memorization.

I love love poems, don’t get me wrong.

They’re beautiful.

You can write them to the person you love. To yourself.

To a hobby.

You can write them to the woman you’ve loved for three years.

That way she can tell you that your poetry is now too formulaic

There’s no creativity, only cliche

The mountains in the poem crumble into valleys

The drawing you spent hours on smudges in memory

Runs red with the blood of your soul.

I love love poems. I love them to death.

I love them so much that when I discovered the work of Andrea Gibson

They played on loop for three days straight.

But I can’t write them. Or can I?

You see, I learned that poetry is like gender.

We’re told there are rules. Boy. Girl. Haiku. Iambic Pentameter.

Rhyme schemes.

And there can be beauty within some of it.

But I’ve realized I don’t have to adhere. Conform.

I can fly high like the eagle cliche.

Or I can waddle on my own simile like a yellow-bellied Marmot in the alpine tundra.

I can write a paragraph in the middle of my poem. A literal passage of prose. After all, if this poem is spoken aloud, who would know the difference between line and sentence? It could be a long-form essay disguised as verse.

There are no rules, only the ones society told us to follow.

Iambic parameter. Haiku.

I can write in those.

It really isn’t that hard.

I just have to try.

But I don’t want to follow those rules.

Unnatural, a sunset that’s the wrong colors.

I want my sunsets filled with the splendor of colors. I want to find my pride in those colors.

I want to see the mountains of my chosen home block the sun from view before its truly gone.

I want my poems to reflect.

Reflect myself.

There are no rules for what a video accompanying this poem might look like.

There are no rules for what this poem being read aloud might sound like.

There are no rules for what a video accompanying this poem might look like.

There are no rules for what this poem being read aloud might sound like.

Repetition is the key to memorization.

But maybe I don’t want to repeat myself.

Maybe I want each line to be unique.

To have a stamp of myself, or a part of myself, in its own way.

Poetry is like gender. An expression of yourself.

Will I read this poem with the rage of a dying star?

Will I read it in a flat monotone?

Or use the voice of hair metal? Or even death metal?

Will it be read in a breathy whisper as two lovers hoping they don’t get caught

By the park ranger at night in a meadow?

Does it even matter, so long as it is my voice?

So long as I don’t let the ghosts of the past silence me?

I can’t memorize for shit. But I can read with passion.

And I can be heard.

https://medium.com/@wdibble/i-cant-memorize-this-383948562f0

#poetry #slam poem #slam poetry #spokenword #spoken poetry #anxiety #my voice #abuse #emotional abuse #abuse tw #memory