#zoetry

[shittygothbitch]

Look at me!

[the-hot-zone]

// river plea // the-hot-zone

[poppunkzain]

2/11/18

[the-hot-zone]

poetry essay loading -- to be a dog is to misunderstand: how the "dog motif" in love poems portrays devotion as distance across perspective. or something like that. basically i want to explore how the dog motif in poem usually relies on a differing of perspective between loved and lover, in which the lover is positioned as a dog in order to do the loving. in doing so, devotion arises from this misunderstanding, in which the "dog" either under-assumes or over-assumes their position in their loved one's life, but sits and stays and rolls over anyways--the hallmark of a dog.

[shittygothbitch]

GROUNDED

The feeling of the pavement underneath my feet

The imperfections

The cracks

The heat

The grass and mud between my toes

With it all I feel connected to the earth

It is grounding in the most literal sense of the word

When I feel most lost

I've found the best thing I can do

Is to connect myself to the ground

Listen to the birds and the bees

And watch as the dance around amongst the leaves and trees

The earth is my rock

Solid and unmoving

And it will give me back what I give to it

Always shaping always moving never and ever changing

It is my home and my love

And will delicately embrace me when it's my time to move on

[shittygothbitch]

I KILLED HIM / I AM ALIVE

There once was a boy

And he was named Zach

He went thru life confused, angry, and sad

For a long time he refused me

He refused me in a way that nobody else could

He broke my heart, destroyed my spirit, and poisoned my body

So I killed him

I killed him

I put my hands around his neck and held on until he was dead

There once was a boy

And he was named Zach

He tried to purge me from this world

So I killed him

And never looked back

/

/

I am alive

In a way I thought not possible

Nearly indescribable

It is more than joy

It is relief

It is more than love

I am complete

I had spent my whole life shackled and isolated

But now I am finally free

Free to live

Free to cry

Free to breathe

And free be me

I wrote these two pieces together at the very beginning of my physical transition. And while they're not entirely how I feel anymore, they're very important to me as like a snapshot into the way I viewed myself once upon a time. Starting hormones really did open up my eyes and my heart to being able to explore myself in a way I wasn't able to before. It was my start line for really becoming the person that I had always wanted to be.

[shittygothbitch]

SUICIDAL

I woke up this morning

I should kill myself

Brushed my teeth, split my flesh, and got dressed

I should kill myself

Skipped breakfast

I should kill myself

Drove to work

Listened to happy songs

I should kill myself

Worked alone for 3 hours

I should kill myself

I should kill myself

I should kill myself

I should kill myself

One for each hour and one more

Got home, showered, skipped lunch

I should kill myself

So much time left in the day

Smoked weed

I should kill myself

Ate junk; chips and ice cream

I should kill myself

Stayed up too late

I should kill myself

I want to be done

I want to be thru

I have no pack

I have no tribe

I ask for too much

I don't ask for enough

I want to kill myself

I'm not going to

For a promise I made

With myself and the Earth

I missed my chance

I fucked that too

I can't wait for the day to come

When I finally kill myself and rid the world of my person

[shittygothbitch]

NAME

Today, someone called me by my name

And I cried

I don't know him and he doesn't know me

He said, "Thanks, Zoe"

And that's all it took

Sometimes it's like a foreign word with how little I hear it

It almost always comes as a jolt

And I feel a tightness in my throat at the sound of it

I love my name

I love my name because it's /mine/

Not given to me or forced upon me

But chosen; and it is oh so sublime

I can be lost in my thoughts; Mourning what I can't have

But that's all it takes to bring me back and remind me of what I do have

A name

My name

You said, "Thanks, Zoe"

You won't remember me tomorrow

But I'll remember you, who so casually called me by my name

So thank you, stranger

You don't know what you did for me

I wrote this one during a time when I was incredibly depressed and Very Lonely. During a time when I was still deadnamed a lot after I had only recently come out at work. And since then I've made even more of a point to make eye contact and address folks in service jobs by their names because working in retail or whatever it's very easy to feel unseen by those around you and it's really nice when someone looks at you and actually Sees you as a person. And you never know if a smile and a hello 'name' can change someone's day.