Trans Rage

By Remy Lourenco

Trigger warning: This poem, which is posted here to honor Transgender Day of Remembrance, includes description of sexual assault and anti-transgender violence.

they call me crazy when I enter the men’s room—

that man

bellowing at the top of his lungs

the hero of the gendered world

marching with his army of

blue and pink swaddles

brandishing his sword of tongues—

but he—

he is only a foot soldier.

former republican executive

Todd Kincannon

said that

there are people who respect

transgender rights

and people who think

we should all be put in a camp

and that he is of the latter

party

and sometimes I cannot breathe

when I think about the Todd Kincannons

who write the law in blood

and vomit hatred

who spit on 

human fucking beings

tell me

what is it?

what is it that you are protecting

so dearly

what is it

about my very

existence

that ignites a hatred in you

akin to Adolf Hitler

because the man in the bathroom

didn’t decide one morning

to begin to hate me

it wasn’t until you 

beat him senseless

with the word “faggot”

and he turned around

and shot

Victoria Carmen White

ten miles away from my house

you gave him the key to my city

to call me

a faggot dyke

in a public restroom,

he doesn’t even know exactly what these words mean

he only knows that they hurt

and he wants me to hurt

the same way he wanted

Brandon Teena

to hurt

when he raped him

and shot him

point blank

I bet he noticed

we have the same haircut

and he’ll find out 

when our blood is pooled on the ground

that it’s the same color

and the Todd Kincannons

can dip their quills in that blood

and sign the lease to concentration camps

to the asylum

the support group

to the ten commandments of gender roles

you don’t get to tell me who I am

you don’t get to decide what my body does and doesn’t do

and if they want to know why I’m so fucking angry

well here it is