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www.maxie.rodeo

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Untitled

*I will update this as an intro to my blog* Everything here is real and a lie; I only write emotional truths "Untitled" is a collection of drafts. I like writing straight to Tumblr because I get a rush, and am forced to let go of some control. This is all medical advice. None of this is medical advice. I woke up on the back of a redwing blackbird, she pulled me out of a pond in Boise, and carried me to Portland. I'm a gemini, in my mid-twenties. I believe in divination, but do not practice in anything but writing and sex. I am a recovering drug addict and alcoholic. I love coke but it kills small children and me. I believe in non-hierarchical anarchic living and loving. My politics are: "When you are not rich you either buy clothes or you buy art." (Gertrude Stein) Accompanied with a naked woman in a house full of art. I make art and I trade it for other peoples' art. I am a woman with red blood stains near the navel of all her shirts.

I just watched Amadeus, and I think it is timeless and good.

I've always wanted to write sci-fi. Short fragments are how I will try. I think Aspen, Annie, Arley, and Nadia are the four best writers I know. In no particular order.

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Tumblrs I like but don't follow and Substacks I keep track of can be found by searching #tumblr girls on my blog. Anything that will likely be edited can also be found by searching #I will update this.

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I lift my sword to cut her throat and my arms wobble I am typing at a keyboard and I am out of breath I lift my sword to cut her throat and my arms wobble she is positioned above me I work backwards I am typing at a keyboard and / am out of breath / she falls on me with her teeth I am typing / / keyboard and / am out of breath /

there is a future where I am Silence, and I lift my sword there is a future where I am silence, and I type on my keyboard there is a past where I am pulling strings, if you snap your fingers, / work backwards /

you get up wash eat drink sit sleep get up wash eat drink sit sleep

there is a future where you are Silence, and you lift your sword Chimera is above you and s/he takes the shape you see in the reflection of your sword / work backwards /

lift sword hands fall keyboard lift sword hands // keyboard

lift sword hands keyboard

/ / __ / / __ / / __

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After Andrene

wiping my forehead I wrap my towel around my waist and notice my- self in side profile, my aching jaw and grey shadow my tight calves and im- potent crotch I have been drifting across lover's couches tonight an erotic film festival I went to impress my lover and went home with a stranger, now my lover or night- lover I let her eat me let her take me I have stopped before the mirror, now my mirror, I drop my towel and Andrene hums through my lips blood now beats where before fallow field sighed now con- tracts in my hands in my mirror

I am now breathing reflects in my still-wet air I write: I'm coming

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After Placenta

when I close my eyes in the bath that will not warm enough I float I smell you running over soft-pulp duff spores jump and tumble under big pines and cedars and I remember how it used to be silent, nobirdsong this close to the planes I wonder where they go as you slide over stream stones and thru what will be devil thorn we roll black tires from the muck, you imagine worlds growing in pooled rainwater, say what new things might be made here in this mix of quiet light and palmed huckleberry outside a dog yelps and I open, you are not here, are not ever yet you linger purple at the edge of my eye waves lap at my ear and then Lola drifts through enameled wall, I lift swimming hair and wonder if she remembers your laugh

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After Placenta

Placenta murmurs those quiet thoughts says out-loud you're ovulating

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After Placenta

I wake up on my back my geranium unfurling between lobed fingers I drop my feet into bath water and shake out my exuberance

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PL-AN

It didn't used to be this way. When we were young we were hypodermic. And that used to be a luxury. Both. To have access and not to brave the daily pill.

Us dolls would get seasonal blood tests, meet with pharmacist twinks to get needles by-the-month. We would draw air with the pink needle, pressurize the bottle, then extract just what we needed. I wasn't squeamish. I wanted to see blood. We would play Placebo or Einstürzende Neubauten to brace ourselves for the pinch. The small needle was blue. With blue needles we would drive the hormonal car into our bellies, thighs, asses, etc. I knew a girl that used her penis as chemical entrance, she only trusted her most extrusive veins.

The small bead meant you had gone too far, or didn't put enough fat in-between. It just meant you'd be sore for the week. A stain on your shirt. T-girl stigmata.

The future is quiet and subtle. A trained palm can feel a PLACENTA breathing. It's like two quick inhales, and then a deep exhale. All under the skin, just to the side of the belly button. We say breathing, but the PLACENTA only excretes.

PLACENTA has replaced the injection. The short story is that a team of scientists (women) studying female crickets in China discovered the crickets were synthesizing their estrogen as-needed, to the moment, depending on what their reproductive system required. The cricket's system was simpler than anything happening at DOW Chemical, or in any state-of-the-art Spanish laboratory. Implants are not new. But girls would scar, implants were always temporary; girls used to rot from the inside out.

PLACENTA is a permanent installation. They call it a "Replacement for Arbitrary Systems," or RAS device. It works quiet under the skin, and renders previous systems unnecessary for hormone production. Within a week after installation, and in some cases, just a few days, PLACENTA outpaces testosterone production and estrogen becomes the dominant hormone in the body.

PLACENTA is not just a permanent installation. It is a permanent replacement. In trials where PLACENTA was removed from rats that initially had testosterone-managed systems, the rats never began to reproduce testosterone. Without any hormones in the body, every rat that had PLACENTA removed, expired quickly.

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Clinical trials are beginning for the ANDRENE system. Cuban researchers studying invasive male locusts breeding with native Angolan populations discovered a system of testosterone creation nearly-identical to that of the Chinese crickets. Working with the original team behind PLACENTA, the two groups devised ANDRENE.

ANDRENE works the same as PLACENTA. Except it replaces the body's natural estrogen system with one that produces solely testosterone: ANDRENE.

I received the PLACENTA system several years after it was commercially available. I am a patient girl. I don't need to be first. I like to know things are safe. I stay up to date; I read headlines and bylines. I watch and I listen.

Last year stories started leaking about rats who had been given both PLACENTA and ANDRENE. Not front page stories in the Times or the Post, but on blogs ran by other watchful girls. Written by girls who had been in clinical studies for PLACENTA, and had contacts in the lab.

Rather than fighting for dominance, PLACENTA and ANDRENE at first seemed to be co-existing in rats. After blood tests, the truth was much more interesting: PLACENTA and ANDRENE seemed to be blending and reproducing something new. A new chemical. A third thing. The blogs are suggesting that ANDRENE has been installed on at least one girl with a PLACENTA.

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Her name is Lola. She is my roommate. We are not girlfriends, but I love her. I am taking care of her while she gets better. While she heals. I am writing this as a diary, to keep watch for other girls that Will walk in Lola's shoes. Lola always knew she was something New. A third thing. Her body is changing, and we think the world will change with it. She calls her new hormone PL-AN, short for PLACENTA-ANDRENE, short for Plan. Lola is part of PL-AN. Soon more PLACENTA Girls, even more ANDRENE Boys will be part of PL-AN.

This is the beginning. Lola's body is beginning to change in ways that scare me and excite me. Lola is the future, PL-AN is how we get there. PL-AN is evolution.

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re-imagining the body {text} excerpts from first wound

"First wound is collective, multifocal; re-imagining the body {text}. Some of our lenses: slant trans-lation, samizdat, archaics (font, text, book binding, etc.), art books, small-batch manuscripts, manifestos, iconography, ZINES not MAGAZINES."

"Slant trans-lation is reproduction through/ around/across language, the practice of non-linear trans-relation. Slant trans-lation is re-imagining the body {text}."

& These excerpts are collected from actual First Wound publications. They are iterations, and I am sharing them with consideration and discretion. Hand to hand, we pass on the page. contact: [email protected]

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Unnamed Biblical Wife

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New York

Getting ready I sew patches on hand-me-down panties and thermals

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Mother Rituals

My mom coughs in her sleep, and I hear the bile budding. She drowns every night. I want to go over and kiss her forehead and turn her like a sick child. She is sick but not sick. She insists on taking me to the nail salon, on going to the makeup store I can't name because I'm so fresh. She tells me bedtime stories. She tells me she is afraid to sleep. She has a ritual before bed. She fills the crook of her throat with peppermints, with lifesavers so she doesn't choke. She tells me sometimes she wakes up and her throat feels closed, but she can still breathe. The doctor dilates her throat, and tells her it will continue to hurt. How long does it last? I don't know. I hold her hand while we drive, I kiss her shoulders while we hug, I tell her I love her. She is scared to leave her home. Her husband a doctor checks her pulse while she naps. It was so low, my heart was trying to compensate. She coughs, and I know she is alive. In the morning her bed is covered in pieces of peppermint. Sleep breaks them into shards. He lifts her head, her eyes flutter, he wonders how he would move her to the floor and start chest compressions without hurting her. Reasons he can get her to the hospital before an ambulance. They don't make her wait in reception. When I was last bleeding from my head, I waited hours to go in. You can take a shower if you promise to sit. We'll make this a spa. After days waiting, my mom is excited by chapstick and lotion. I'm sitting in bed and she pours some into my hand. Just smell it, isn't it delicious? My mother is sepsis and bile in her sleep. We spend the day doing what makes her happy. She is a ten year lag in this city. We pull on gates and try doors that do not open. What ever made her happy here? Home is my dogs and my husband and you and your brother. You are my favorite daughter. She is trying and I cry in her arms. There is no other way to get through to her.

My therapist says we think we must first forgive ourselves. It is not so simple. We have to feel it from others. We can feel it in ourselves. I think of The Last Temptation. Jesus sits in the brothel and watches men fuck Mary Magdalene. When they all leave, he goes to her bed. What have I done wrong? Who are you to think you are better? She is right and he is wrong. He leaves and she stays. I don't know what this means for my mom and I. Forgiveness is complicated. She tells stories from childhood that make me angry. I tell her and she is upset. We both cry and nothing feels good. I love her and I don't want her to die. I forgive her. Maybe she forgives herself. I wonder if she forgives me. I do not forgive myself. In the morning I sit by her on her bed and I hold her in my arms. I talk with her and look forward. It is easier to say what you feel when you can't see the other. When she cries she hides her tears. I kiss her cheek and weep.

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Other Girls Working

I love when I'm working my at-home receptionist job and I get calls from clocky trans girls named Aubrey working for places like Sunshine Waterfall Billing that register as being from places like Manila Philippines. Those are my favorite voicemails, I listen to them over and over and think Pleasant thoughts. I let people think I'm a Sweetboy over the phone and use that to my advantage, but I love hearing dolls clocking In and clocking Out.

I don't need any Services right now Aubrey, but I do love you!

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bathroom stall

my lover he left his wife pleaser and I washed it wrapped in silk cloth

unwrapped in washer set cotton on my soft legs quiver under weight

and I slip it on under jacket my nipples tense I choke clear throat

imagine his eyes on my body warm travel up my spine my throat

transfiguration! my feet lift or he lifts my hips toward cloud as sink

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The space between me and me is you. This is a mystery.

& art: Terracotta rim and upper body fragment with concentric circles (or spirals?) and bands. 1400 - 1200 BCE, Minoa, terracotta, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. && text: Anne de Marcken, It Lasts Forever And Then It's Over.

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This is what I do not tell you.

I do not tell you my name because I am afraid you would use it wrong. I want you to describe me in your own words, and even if they are wrong, they are honest. And I know that. For a long time we sit on the grey leather couch and I look up at the wall above the gas fireplace, at the portrait of the beast and the moon and the trees. The moon is not full, and I wonder why. You both look at me. I can't see you both at the same time, so I look away. Between. You say it's different with the girls. And I don't think any of us know why. My legs are cut from shaving. They won't heal and it hurts my heart. It's evidence, I think to myself. This is how you would say my name. Cut it.

Outside the moon is full, and I feel it in my new breasts. I tell you both that they are sore and you seem surprised. Like this is unexpected. Like I haven't always. The youngest girl is starting puberty at nine, you say, her parents are going to stop it. We all wonder what that means.

I don't expect you to know how. I walk in a sentence before you can catch me. My name is like a melting ice cube that slips between your lips and lands across the room. We have to touch lips to pass the ice, in this process it melts faster, and becomes water. Across the room you describe me and haltingly practice. It sounds like ice water spilling on your shirt, and it is ugly. I do not trust you when you say my name.

When you each describe me you use the same words, and I know you love me. You don't try to name me, and instead you name what I am. This I understand. When I was born you both took turns holding me. I would sleep on your belly or in your arms, when I first cried you kissed my forehead and you cried too. I have pieces of each of you in my arms. your bones; one heart, two eyes.

These are the things that do not change. These are the things you call when you love me, and these are the things I feel when I kiss your lips, let you hold me, when I cry.

I am afraid to say my name. To hear you try. I want to see you both at once; hold your hands and cry.

& "This is what I do not tell you." is from Anne de Marcken's It Lasts Forever And Then It's Over. Page 30.

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Kicked In Door Second Draft

I asked Julia for feedback and what I think now is that the piece does not hinge on the mother's racist assertion of "a Mexican," I wanted to write it again and draft it here, publicly, as an experiment. he got his door kicked in, by his door kicked in I mean his head, months ago, and that he died, he died in November, but he got his head kicked in after the brain bleeds, those started months before, months before he got his head kicked in, after the last bar fight, his mother said he had been drugged, but we knew better and told her, and she told us they threw him out, and that's when they kicked his door in, his head I mean, like a door, swung open like he had done to other men, before, for less, or for more, or my mom said he would beat other men in the front yard sometimes sometimes I would look out the window of my room, and see the lights of motorcycles pulling up to our driveway

and when I saw the room again, and the window I couldn't say anything, and his mother, she said nothing, and my brother he said the room looked small now, and I was glad he was there to speak, and I opened all the cabinets and doors, I was looking for she said what are you looking for, and I said, I don't know, there were some things we left behind and she said why didn't you get them earlier, he probably threw them out earlier, and my brother did not laugh and I cried and she said nothing, while my brother told her we couldn't come back and I would have kicked in the door if I saw it, but his head was in the way if I kicked in the door I would have hit his head, like a door I would kick and kick until something gives and a broken man spits blood and bile, and keeps his door barred with a rifle, and by barred I mean he guards his door with a hunting rifle, he takes my mother's keys, sits on her chest blunt end of the barrel my brother, who was eleven the violence of an age naming I walk through his house and the door and the bar and the neighborhood and the big house, with the hole at its base, unfilled, and the apples still rotting in the backyard, I took three things from the house first I took something back he had taken, it was on his shelf and I did not ask his mother I said this was mine, the second, a video, of the fort we built in the backyard my brother and I built a fort and it was full, of leaves now, I took a video, third I stole his grocery list to take something of his I did not know, and to know he couldn't stop me, would never get it back I went in to the house with my brother and we left together I am tracking after writing: I felt I needed to break it, and it naturally fell into these pieces, "what happened, what happened, what happened..." I wanted my brother to be there with me throughout the piece, and I listened to Julia, and my gut, about the edginess of the first draft. I kept the line break pattern at the end of each sentence, and wonder if I should tie each segment into following the established program of the previous, ie, If-combined into one giant block the sentence pattern would dissolve. Maybe this is okay, and gives more credence to the segmentation. I don't see this as a final draft.

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In The End a Mexican Kicked His Door In Anyway

he got his door kicked in, and by that I mean his Head, he got his head kicked in, months ago, yes, but that isn't what started the brain bleeds, no, those started months before, months before he got his head kicked in, after the last bar fight, his mother said he was drugged, but we told her we knew he liked meth and he liked to drink and she said it was a Mexican who kicked him, his head I mean, like a door, kicked him in after he was kicked out of the bar for starting another one, another bar fight with a stranger, and my mom said he would beat people in our front yard sometimes, sometimes I would look out the window of my room and see the lights of motorcycles pulling up to the driveway, and when I saw the room again, and the window I couldn't say anything, and his mother she said nothing, and my brother, and his mother, she was saying that alcohol is such a terrible thing, and as I looked around the house, she said what are you looking for, and I said I don't know there were some things we left behind, and she said why, why didn't you come get them he must have thrown them out so long ago, and I imagined coming back years ago, how I would have kicked in the door, like a Mexican kicks in the head of a man who, by kicks in I mean, like a door, kicks and kicks until something gives and a broken man spits blood and bile and keeps his door barred with a rifle, by barred I mean he guards his door with a hunting rifle takes my mother's keys, sits on her chest, beats my brother, who was eleven, the violence of an age, naming, I walk through the old house and think about why we did not come back, why we could not come back and I think of the Mexican and the door, and the bar, and I have no grief for the dead, who have no grief left to feel, anyway how did his mother know it was a Mexican that kicked his door in and why wasn't it me, anyway