Binary Dreams
It's a picture like those movies you hate, you know, the kind you watch with your friends over slightly over-cooked Mac and cheese at 2am.
My floor is a sea of clothes, my full length mirror on my chair against my wall
I am wearing something not safe for work
Something to make the audience forget I'm underage for a minute
To let the cars drive by honking and screaming something that would mean that it was my fault
That kind of outfit
And I'm watching myself
And I dont hate my body, this is minefield conversation
I don't hate the curves of my body or the lumps of fat on my chest
I send a photo. To my boyfriend. He approves.
But I send photos of my chest bound and my jaw contoured and he approves of that and my presentation is so fluid it slides onto my floor in a sea of clothes
Mostly black.
Some labeled "female" some from men's collections, there's a tube of lipstick in there, some smell of Old Spice and travel-sized Axe
And I wasn't meant to be the protagonist
I'm someone else's manic pixie dream girl except I forgot my lines
I'm a manic pixie, my own dream, everything I want to be in a collared shit and pink hair
This body isn't a minefield, it isn't something wrong
My chest binder is black, hidden amongst the dark shirts and skinny jeans
Something lace and ribbon tucked away, dark against my pale and fat and gender
And I send a photo of me smiling to my boyfriend. My hair a mess, eyes crinkled at the edges
And he approves
This poem is about:
Me