Men Who Love & Kill

(by Warsan Shire)

CW/TW: poetics/politics of death, murder, transphobia, sexual violence,

mentions of anti-black violence and police brutality...

          How is that love becomes one's drive/force to kill ? Perhaps because fear is part of love too, as "our men do not belong to us... Then the men we try to love, say we carry too much loss, wear too much black, are too heavy to be around, much too sad to love. Then they leave and we mourn them too. Is that what we’re here for? To sit at kitchen tables, counting on our fingers the ones who died, those who left and the others who were taken by the police, or by drugs, or by illness or by other women. It makes no sense. Look at your skin, her mouth, these lips, those eyes, my God, listen to that laugh. The only darkness we should allow into our lives is the night, and even then, we have the moon..." (Warsan Shire).

          I don't know how many little naps I've had to take to escape reality in the past few days. The amount of media witnessing/documenting/visualizing continuous trans deaths, anti-black murders, and cases of police brutalities, informations carrying the heaviness of such patterning melancholy, grief, and rage. Social media then becomes a violent daily reminder for the uncertainties of marginalized lives as well as the systems of marginalized deaths, even among uncertainties of global health... I started writing this piece to heal through understanding the pains/intersections of trans and femme violence/deaths, and how femininities have been raised/taught to love/protect masculinities that often hurt us. The relations between violence, cis-masculinity, and trans-femininity has been of betrayal for the notions that we as penis/ego-holders choosing paths of softness instead... Yet it is through grace and studying violence for freedom, that I know we must continue to challenge masculinities while embracing/caring for men and folks with identities that are masculine-centered. Especially through the years of witnessing both cis and trans men (re/un)learning toxic/hyper-masculinities, often which is even more challenge/of survival burdens for racialized/migrant men... It's been a critique brewing within, as even though I joke about loving men/masculinity as an unfortunate event from the experiences of ra*e and violence, the studies/advocacy of feminist movements have often left out the work of healing collectively across genders thus the rehabilitations of toxic/hyper-masculinities. We must learn from the legacies of native/black feminism as #BlackLivesMatter too is a social movement with many feminine organizers as main leaderships, often advocating for masculine narratives of experiencing violence (centered in mass media). It brings the attention to the silence surrounding deaths of black/indigenous women/femmes as well...

          As a non-black individual: the pains of anti-black violence is not mine, even though I have felt by witnessing/living/understanding the world around me, the violences against people I love, and the police harassments and physical/sexual assaults from positionalities of being trans, racialized, feminine, a sex worker from past survival circumstances... My sympathy falls on the spectrum of colonial-constructions for racialization and colourist violence, and I (re/un)learn my allyhood daily by reminding myself that I will never be able empathize without references to other intersecting measures of experiencing violences nor will I ever be able to understand/feel the mourning of black families/friends/loved ones. Thus as much as pain allows us to unite narratives through support and solidarity, I believe in the compassionate politics of (re/un)learning absence as an ally: not absence as ignorance/denial/inaction, but absence as in knowing when to shut up or leave, to not take up space when you're only a guest to this narrative of feeling/learning. It is understanding that even with a common enemy, that support is also by simply offering space to grief/heal, even if it's in private/silence... Thus again from legacies of how "in the Black Panthers’ paper Huey Newton (August 1970) wrote 'A letter to the Revolutionary Brothers and Sisters about Women’s Liberation and Gay Liberation' arguing that they were fellow revolutionary movements and pledging the Panthers to support gay liberation": It is the responsibilities of allyhood to demand for justice, to support and show up in solidarity along front-line activists as well as healers.

"The future belongs to those who prepare for it today." - Malcolm X (1962)

          I think over the years of surviving/studying violence as well as loving masculinities that I become a (re)searcher/fighter for softness. And I believe that in order to achieve true gender liberation/peace/equity, we must work with masculinities through compassionate/empathy politics, collective (re)learning of emotional intelligence and notions of strength, as well as allowing masculinities to rehabilitate in their own organicalities (as I am only a feminine essence even if educational to toxic/hyper-masculinities)... Like the ways trans/awakening women/femmes rebirth femininities: it is for masculine-centered folks to finalize/actualize their glories in softness as well. Thus how I observe/study my navigation/survival with men/masculinities too, in many ways I find hyper-masculine men/masculinities to yearn for a safe space to embrace/express softness, as they are surviving through the violence of patriarchy too, especially racialized men under colonial-white-supremacy. My experiences with cis-white men have been mostly cases of asian/trans-fetishizing chasers and creepy old men who wants a young toy to keep, or an insecure man wanting a girl that's "different" for something "new". I found that many cis-white men (I've encountered with) feel comfortable and validated (or on the toxic ends of the spectrum: entitled) with their yearn for care and acceptance of difference, though often socialized as the "nice guys", I still find traces of manipulation or denials of privilege/entitlement in the courtships that are never in my best interests... The loving/killing/lusting of intersex/trans/non-binary folks is not generally a racial issue but one gendered, often concerning the violences of cis/toxic/hyper-masculinity. Yet the racialization of masculinities and the layers of violence as survival makes it much of a racial issue too while we think for the queer/2-Spirit/trans Black/Indigenous folks, who have always been at the forefronts of community advocacy no matter if feminine/masculine-centered, polygendered, genderly-fluid, or communicated/expressed to be agendered... I humbly navigate through layers of socio-political violences to understand pain and melancholia, hoping to (re/un)learn grief for healing and to contribute softness as an ally/friend, a flower/lover, and/or a sister/mother/daughter.

          As grief starts the journey of healing: the first lesson to freedom. In "Black Queer Studies, Freedom, and Other Human Possibilities" with reference to Marlon Rigg’s works: “His homopoetics is importantly a different embodiment, one that speaks its pain as potential freedom. In that moment, Riggs highlights how our lives can make no sense outside of his coming death, the collective deaths of Riggs, Joe Beam, Hemphill, and especially Audre Lorde—the foundations of a black queer studies—demand to think desire and politics in the present as a way of making reparation with ‘our dead behind us.’ Such reparation allows for a life that can be lived with a freedom not yet felt, but one genuinely yearned for. Freedom as a way toward new ways of being human in the present, ways of being human in which black life preceded black death and is continually fashioned by death even before its birth—our embodiment takes place in the context of reckoning with life-death-world experience” (Walcott 2013)...

          And after recent viral cases of black/trans murders in the Americas with public medias advocating justices for Tony Mcdade, Regis Korchiniski, George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and Nina Pop... Not to mention trans latina/xs' survival as Layla Peláez and Serena Angelique Velázquez murdered in Puerto Rico, and Jesusa known locally as Chucha found recently beheaded in Mexico, as well as the other continuing deaths globally/transnationally - no matter documented/visible/recognized or not. I can only write of grief now after reflecting on freedom, and as Judith Butler reminds us: "All these lost lives are grievable, which means that they are lives worthy of acknowledgment, equal in value to every other life, a value that cannot be calculated" (2020)... Often times I see trans-feminine faces online with a sense of familiarity, they become my sisters, maybe from the relations of survival or maybe just my brain playing tricks after seeing reposts after reposts, yet thus I understand/feel better/deeper of the notions and discourses described in "Black Queer Studies, Freedom, and Other Human Possibilities". As a trans woman of colour with our global life-expectancy of 35 years old, it becomes more than poetry reading the words “our dead behind us” while feeling/carrying the weight of my mothers/sisters/femmes/siblings; from the missing and murdered Indigenous folks, the violence against our brothers, to the often trafficked and sexually abused racialized intersex/trans sex workers - I grief in melancholia with a collective promise in solidarity: navigating/fighting/learning/teaching for those alongisde/after us... However, its still important to respect/honour difference even when bridging identities/experiences and aligning politics in the name of intersectionality/unity; my community-understandings/actions in solidarity must emerge from the reflections/critiques against the violence/solitude of embodying settler-colonialism. And though understanding such intersections of violence through empathizing experiences of commonality, it is to note of trans-misogynoir as black trans women/femme are still the most targeted as subjects of murder/homicide while native/black cis/trans-men continue to die from police brutalities and state violences...

          So healing through love: How do we begin ? Other than the continuing lessons of allyhood and actionable solidarity, I pray we rest, especially in ever so softness for the black folks retraumatized. With a softer essence as a fighter for love, it is only in love's full glory that we demand for justice, even if it means no peace... Resonating with Murther Luther King Junior's reminder of how "a riot is the language of the unheard" (1965), it is importantly necessary to recognize/embrace the heavy histories and emotions in the awakening from painful losses. May we find healing slowly, gently, and gloriously through support/solidarity, while our community front-liners and allies demand for and organize towards justice fiercely... Sending love and light to all especially those often caring for others - the activists/organizers/healers/care-takers/lovers during this time.

Community Resources/Actions:
Anti-Racism Resources
MINNESOTA FREEDOM FUND
Justice For Regis
Justice For Tony McDade

Moving In & On

("Solitude" by Warsan Shire)

"God, my alone feels so good, but lately I’ve craving something more, something deeper

I want love. But not just any kind of Love,
no, I want a love so deep it’d make the ocean jealous.

But I’ll only have you if you’re sweeter than my solitude...

You must love me for everything I’m worth,

and then some..."

          Why loving has been so painful, like embracing a rainbow only to be left with the wind ? Maybe love will always be painful for "I'm lonely so I do lonely things"; Maybe love will always be bitter when I don't love myself thus a bittersweet lesson of self-preservation... Then "I was still lonely so I did even lonelier things," and "I had to leave [because] I felt lonely when he held me..." Maybe I wasn't ready for love, but perhaps the lesson also had its timing. I remembered saying I would never sleepover at a mans, and funny how now I still cry myself longing to be held: "Forgive me, I was lonely so I chose you. I'm a lover without a lover; I'm lovely and lonely"... Now that I have tasted and felt love, I still fear myself in love ironically when love has been what's keeping me alive as well. The truth is that I'm afraid of my solitude, but I also know that without loving myself first by example, the world will never learn to carry my heavy heart... However, sometimes I wonder if maybe the lesson's never to teach the world but to just practice the art of self-love, to not just write poetry but to actually believe that "I belong deeply to myself" ("34 Excuses For Why We Failed at Love" by Warsan Shire).

          I'm afraid of moving on; I'm afraid of not being loved, I'm afraid of not loving enough, I'm afraid of not being enough... I pray for vulnerability to lead me onto paths of freedom, I meditate on the nights of feeling hopeless and I honour the rivers I've cried to survive. Yet I must do better, I have to... Instead of crying and holding myself through darkness, the lesson is perhaps to love myself through it, to embrace myself no matter the worth. As like the moon, we don't always feel full but we are still loved and deserving of light, no matter the phase...

          I'm also afraid of moving in, as I'm moving into the city for June, finally, but still during a pandemic. I always make decisions my mother questions, but I tell myself that the uncertainties of others only make my mission more deeply personal. I'm not to be understood by reasons, but to be by feelings. I know I make decisions to constantly challenge my comfort zones, almost as if I don't allow myself to have comfort zones... Virgo in both Sun & Moon: being good is not/never good enough; there is always a work in progress. Maybe it's positive to obsess over self-betterment and improvement, as my processes so far have been just studying/working as worth and rotting slowly at home... I need change, close to community, and compassion. I need a room above earth, I need sunlight, I need to start planting and growing the gardens I have been planning. I want a new room and bed, a new start, a new chapter. And I wish this time I know it's not to run away but to resettle/refocus/relearn of loving my own solitude, in all phases again...

          What do I deserve ? Why does a flower deserve to bloom ? ... I'm afraid of not being happier after I've moved aboveground, but isn't it unfair ? I know happiness to be one's responsibility but for me it has only felt like a burden. Maybe I'm getting too comfortable in my sadness, thus unsafe in solitude... The lesson of this Spring/Summer becomes a soft reminder, of patience and healing as I start to plant/water my garden within. I come to slowly realize that it is never too late for a wilting houseplant, to dream/plan of love, freedom, and light.

"... Remember that I want to be loved as deep as the ocean, but 

Remember that I am like the ocean -

I can slip through your fingers, but manage to hold up an army of ships

Kiss me, hold me, love me, but tell me if you’re not up for it...

I’ll only have you if you’re sweeter than my solitude"

- "Solitude" by Warsan Shire

My First Man/Love/Relationship

("For Women Who Are 'Difficult' to Love" by Warsan Shire)

          I hesitate with the idea of having someone close and intimate. I'm scared to rot comfortably in someone's comforts, to make a home out of human desperate for care... Yet it really comes when you least expect it: the pains of loving and the pains of loneliness meet me here at the intersections of both memories and imagination. I am thankful, for those who have helped given me lessons/stories of love in my life, even if it is through crying then understanding... I'm also humbled by loving/being loved, as I will always have more to give from within for those too concerned/occupied with survival to fill in substance, to love/be loved fully. And yet I still apologize for my trial-and-error in loving myself deeper thus caring for others better, as I shall then continue to (re/un)learn through loving beyond.

Me: "... but you're not a criminal."

Him: "baby... I'm a Black man in America"

          I remember our first night together last August: cuddling/sleeping naked, kissing and sharing stories of our past, holding each other tighter... No sex, even though he had already made me feel so safe in his arms, he knew of a soft night was what I needed. It was just weeks after I was ra*ed, and it wasn't the first time encountering a man of complicated pasts either. A rough intellect I would say, troubled with memories of societal neglect that still haunts him until today. And not the first time I have people who I care about having experiences of street violence, financial/housing instability, childhood traumas...etc but as lovers I felt like it began as trauma-bonding/trading/sharing, and I was scared of a toxic attachment... like between my parents.

          About 8 months of learning each other's touch: he shared knowledges of herbal/crystal meditation/healing, I shared poems and political imaginations, continuing conversations about both the intersections and differences of black/trans lives, and how our sexualities are impacted by society. I remember fighting into 3AM about the usage/violence of fetishization and porn productions, but I also remember him holding me doing breathing exercises at 5AM when I shook with flashbacks and panic attacks... He is older, his economic ambitions remind me of my father and his brothers, his aggression reminds me of men and men before but he is different: he is goofy/funny, always trying to make me smile, he's smart and secretly soft deep inside - only when no one else is around... I asked him often about me not feeling prioritized/cared-for and why he even loves me, he would asked me why I can't just be more patient and "chill". Women/femmes spend their lives waiting for loved ones, and maybe selfish but I can not wait for change nor peace, not here at "home". He overworks and hustles hard on wheels around the city, and though unrelated but I hate how he never uses a wallet so his things are just everywhere in his pockets/bag. I don't know why I encounter and entertain so many deliverymen, both of goods and drivers of people... It's a lot to unpack, and as a trans woman/femme of colour who have very limited subjects of interests/attraction after eliminating tranny-chasers of fetishization, old (and mostly white) sugar daddies, and "discreet" married men, I find myself left with also a margins of men and masculine folks of complex backgrounds/stories. I dislike patterns of heteronormativity in my connections of intimacy, and I really am open to more possibilities beyond cis-men, especially when trans-masculine folks are sexy in the city and some butch woman/femmes have gotten me more open minded about my own romantic attractions as well... Yet as long as I am with a cisgender man, there becomes layers of socialized-heteronormativity and internalized-homophobia to unpack (yes even with queer men too), especially in a positionality of a trans woman without bottom surgery and for if/when the connection ever becomes sexual (even though most are already lustful due to the fetishizing reality of transhood after colonialization, often even more desired without bottom surgery for the fantasy of a secret cock).

          I started to be aware of my connections/relationships/encounters with racialized cis-men and their stories/struggles, especially when I also push to have more personal/emotional conversations. Often I find cis-men to open up not only because I try my best to create a safe space but also because perhaps their time with a trans woman/femme becomes an escape from the burdens of cis-heteronormative hyper-masculinities, especially as racialized cis-men, migrants, as black men... Their stories struggling with masculinity is not mine to ever share or use as public analysis, but I dare to be truthful to the narratives I've encountered/involved with as so many trans mothers and sisters have been hurt/killed from just loving cis-men, waiting for masculinities to (re/un)learn and change. Maybe a selfish project of coping with past sexual violence, maybe desperate for stories/evidence of humanization/empathy or an allyship over sadness/loneliness/survival... I find my attraction towards trauma not a romantic issue with relational subjects while definitely involving and impacting intimate relationships, but as a toxicity deeply rooted in my survival methodologies navigating self-love and stupid poetic-hopeless-romantic self. Thus really, I thought I would not fall in love just yet... til I do, hard.

Him: "don't worry, I'm eating right now... consuming love from you."

          He supported me with herbs and groceries, and I would support him financially and with accessibility here and there also. The heaviness of such love made me grow cold, and I began to realize how loving/caring words and company won't feed a person or pay one's debt. Nor could any amount of reassurance can settle my mind when the people I care about are hungry/unsafe. I was exhausted/lonely for waiting: worried daily wondering if he's safe on the road, if he has eaten, and if he has slept enough, etc. Such relationship has confronted me with harsh truths of societal/economic as determination of priority... How can I love and convince a person to pause/breathe when capitalism chases them day and night ? What is my care and allowance of access worth to their survival and how can we do better, for each other and together ? Like the ways me and my sisters support each other, like the ways the community feeds me with both resources and teachings, and like the ways we can continue loving/caring for each other: I knew we had to become partners/allies/friends, anything but lovers...

"I know my love,

It's forgiving

It's gentle

It's long-suffering

It's tucking away my tears and listening to

your reasons for hurting me

It's piecing together your childhood trauma

and feeling sympathy for the darkness you still carry

My love will remove the light from my eyes

to find beauty in all your dark places 

My love is deep and beautiful and sacred...

But my love

My love no longer lives in the hands of those who abuse it

My love belongs to me."

- Aschel St Ville (@sabrinajpoetry)

          I realize now that I must not thank him for meeting after I was ra*ed but to thank myself... However, I do thank him for holding me holier and wiping my tears away, reminding me that while I am searching for softness in others, that softness is already in me too... My first relationship didn't have room for romance, no time to pause, always on the go, and maybe selfishly I wanted superficiality like dates of youth simple pleasures. Somewhere on the dance floor of marginalization we found each other, holding onto one another in times of need but isn't love more than survival ? Yet in explaining my decision to break-up in the simplest way is the struggle between attraction and compatibility. Especially when he's a virgo too... where he is growing a mountain and I'm planting a garden, thus friendship/partnership is what I've proposed. He is wiser and much more understanding, it has been hard to move on from my feelings for him while still keeping in touch and caring closely. I can't help but wonder if it's because he needs my resources too, yet it's unfair that I often in analysis question my attraction to him as care after violent circumstances, and his attraction to me as accessibility... The emotions of/from such connection have been strong but unstable, and I am still learning to process/cope without turning too cold/analytical/cynical.

Him: "babe I'm a dreamer not a thief."

I know baby, I know...

          He has always been a dreamer for freedom as I am for love. I will miss us sharing lessons of life/culture/history with each other through intimacy, yet someday maybe again, when we're better and more stable. I will always remember and miss waking up to him smoking a joint and holding me close, him making jerk-chicken quesadillas for brunch, and him gone to the store for juice. He is the first man who has taught me of truly loving/being loved, and he was open to change/grew/blossomed so much along the way as well... I know we will continue supporting each other and navigate our feelings and circumstances, but I know I need a break from romantic intimacy and committed relationships for now. It breaks my heart but he also said that one day I'm going to find someone "softer, more relaxed, and not pressured from goals like an animal"... We didn't go to the mall nor markets/festivals because crowds and families could be triggers; we didn't do valentine's day because he wanted/needed to work. Yet I was understanding while constantly checking my privileges as well; I have nothing but gratitude as we did make it our little universe even just spending time inside smoking and ordering in take-out (with only occasional trips to nature). We were my first love story and I will always treasure the memories of us as lovers while imagining/practicing for love/care beyond...

My first love story: where

A flower sends her kisses to

A mountain with petals in the wind,

And the mountain embracing her 

with dancing leaves flowing from streams

...

It ends beyond attraction and compatibility

in support and solidarity:

We become family,

We build community,

We (re/un)learn to love better -

A breakup or wakeup, for

An ending is but another start

...

We wake up today and tomorrow:

Loving ever so softer, for

Those after us and to the world/beyond

How I Miss Being Asian/Taiwanese

CW/TW: mentions of mental health

          A settler-immigrant's confession of surviving through cultural-abandonment and conditioned self-assimilation into (colonial-)Canadian society: Taiwan is a homeland deep in memories yet further more distant in the courage/will to remember... Breathing through the in-betweens of cultural/national/ancestral identities/expressions/teachings/learnings of belonging/worth, she is lost within herself. It's not that she's trying to be someone she's not, nor is it because she is uncertain of who she is. It is her art of just trying to be: nothing, and everything, all at once, in a breath...

          I believe that in a way, my parents were visionaries the way they prepared our family to be global/transnational citizens. Not only because my true/trans identity was nurtured transnationally, but because I know my parents also planned for future possibilities, as survival. A modern, privileged warfare of bodies/labours in trade for the (North)American dream, and I dare say this because I know of my immigrant status through the Canadian government to be an evidence of the continuous oppression/genocide against its First Nations/Indigenous/Native peoples. Yet the (North)American dream is a lie, and now I couldn't help but wonder of my worth/purpose here on this land... Going back to my roots as healing, I feel the call to confess of my cultural wandering, in order to serve and love my families/communties better.

          Taiwan to Singapore: island to island, a subtropical island in East-Asia to a tropical island even smaller in Southeast-Asia. I remember learning "proper" English to be the priority for those years of young, yet I also remember coming home crying, from bullying and social rejection/isolation... Growing up in Taiwan and leaving at the age of 9, looking back I know I began seeking belonging then while introduced to new diversity and multiculturalism with children starting to practice socio-political, categorical call for groupings. It was a private Chinese-speaking/teaching elementary school a long bus ride away that I remembered studying hard to test into. I remembered walking to the bus when it was still dark in the mornings; I would often fall asleep, miss my stop, and get lost but luckily as a 9/10 years old light-skinned "boy" in a strict/lawful society/neighbourhood that I've always had assistance/guidance when needed... Then on a parent-teacher day, I remembered sitting beside my mother with her asking about my issues of making friends and fitting in, and I remembered my teacher saying that there seems to be no issues with my grades and that I was good/obedient in the classroom. I was a "good boy"; contrast to my brother fighting, acting out, and skipping schools, which is why we had to move to Malaysia after too, because he couldn't adapt. Yet reflecting now, I really appreciated my brother's rage and resistance against authority during those times growing up when I was learning submission as survival, even though he was acting out due to the pains of family neglect, social isolation, and cycles of abuse/abandonment. We also must silently admit of the ways our travel stories aligning with our mother's survival: being a woman fleeing from pains of silence, family/work pressures, patterns of domestic violence, marriage instability, and the foundations of her mental illness... Then in Malaysia, more violence and patriarchal power for my brother to cope, and more bullying of daily physical violence and sexual harassment as well as social rejection for my femininity. Tropical, we were in an international elementary school in Kuala Lumpur; I remembered finding joys in the walks to English/Math tutors/classrooms but passionately learning words in Malay to sing its national anthem... I remembered being lonely, but okay with it; I remembered loving my solitude even through the uncertainties of being in-between.

"My lonliness keeps me going..." 

- Ms. Rajput, 42, transgender woman in India

          Through the years of social rejection and violence growing up as a feminine child/"boy" in Asia had me believing that my liberation of truth somehow needs to be credited to Canada as well. However I do come to realize that my trans-journey really is transnational, international, and definitely racially-impacted as well. I have learnt to grow/navigate as a woman/femme from the examples I have witnessed/felt, from the coloured feminine figures/spirits of the pacific oceans: the roots of my being and the waves of my self-identification/realization/actualization. And while the nurturing of my femininity in Asia was a lonely practice, I look back to give thanks for the silent teachings, in which I also give credit to myself, for listening/learning, for planting/watering a seed, for growing/fighting/blooming/surviving... 

          I remembered promising myself to find belonging in Canada no matter what and to stop being bullied at schools. I remembered sitting in front of our motel's room's TV, watching Disney/Nickelodeon at the age of 12, repeating words I was trying to understand, wishing to wash away any traces of an Asian accent. I remembered embarrassment for miscommunication while helping my parents with the bank, mail, the schools, the house-viewings...etc, but telling myself that it was worth the practice, so I can be more perfect in times of need. Somewhere along the way I realized that I was never able to fit in through gendered behaviours/norms, especially after coming out as gay/queer at 13. I started making friends and finding community as white cis-girls' "gay best friend" in rural suburbia, I remembered flamboyance as my only protection against this colonial-cis-heteronormative patriarchy, I remembered admitting queerness as a way desperate for social-understanding/inclusion, no matter how pitiful/performative... I remembered mistaking white femininity as an ideal/escape, maybe even an ally against the violence at/from home.

          Thus the reality of my white/west-washing survival, my psychological abandonment of culture/heritage, and my socio-political assimilation/submission: all for desperate feelings of belonging with communities I'll never feel enough for. Now the title of "immigrant" almost becomes selling-checkmarks as marginalized storytellers, yet how do I represent an experience while denying its substance/impact ? I come to confess of my failure as a community member/representative/storyteller, that I have become so good at solidarity I started to rot in my own solitude... How ironic, that I can participate in conversations/discussions, maybe even practices of other cultures but never my own ? I have gotten so good at becoming/learning/being the "racialized" while denying my own specifications of belonging; I can quote race theories and share artful stories, histories, victories, injustices of all coloured people but of those who actually look like me... It is only grief that I feel as a proud/soft Taiwanese woman, an East-Asian transgender femme, and a Pacific-island girl while reflecting back on my journey of identity. Something, is indeed missing, something I have hidden and buried: the embrace of my own homeland/culture/roots... It was for survival that I traded in my cultural identities/memories, tired of feeling hopeless, misunderstood, and rejected from my own families and those who look like me, I had to abandon and seek for superficial support of false solidarities. Yet now for salvation, I dare to confess in raw and vulnerability, of how I miss being and feeling Asian/Taiwanese: How I will forgive myself for ever thinking I'm less than/unworthy of my culture, how I will continue to represent and realize/actualize of the rich queer/trans expressions in my ancestry, how I shall continue watering my roots, digging for a rediscovery and planting for new possibilities of unity and liberation...

"I walked into the classroom,

feeling like a drop of oil,

staining the perfectly white blouse..."

- Leon Tsai: The Yellow Stain (2016)

          Walking out and diving in/deeper: crafting/redefining one's cultural belonging, and honouring/reconnecting with those who came before and those alongside me now... all for those after, and beyond.

Call Me Mother/Mental

"Mother says there are locked rooms inside all women; 

kitchen of lust, bedroom of grief, bathroom of apathy...

Sometimes the men - they come with keys,

and sometimes, the men - they come with hammers."

- Warsan Shire: The House

CW/TW: family, mentions of domestic/sexual violence, mental health,

mentions of substance-use and suicidal ideation

          I embrace emotions too much, often only here, where I feel the constant need to keep pushing for emotions/reactions/something/anything... An outburst at mother's day dinner: perhaps triggered by mentions of someone joining the military, perhaps continued by last night's drunk in solitude while crying/puking in the backyards of rural suburbia, or perhaps just the accumulated suicidal-grey with silenced memories in a home/house/room I don't know how to feel/stay safe at... How does one feel so lost but stuck at the same time ? It all happened so fast, I remember screaming/asking for answers: teach me how to survive, and tell me how you have really supported my survival ? I asked my family over take-out food getting colder by the minute, that if they would even know why/what happened if/when I die ? An ungrateful child of disgrace, I hate how selfish I become at home: triggering a broken inner-child desperate for love and care, drowning in the years spent/loved in conflict, fighting for freedom, acceptance, sympathy/empathy, and solidarity...

          I apologized, left into the rain for fresh air, and came back still crying as if it was another family fight from years ago. I apologized again and again, begging my mom to stop the dishes and for my brother to stay in the space. I explained of how unstable my mental health has been, and just how hurtful it is to stay in a home with memories of alcoholism, domestic violence, as well as the years of uncertainty/self-hate/harm during exploring/becoming... I apologized for my selfishness, and how I've been in desperate need of emotional support and allyship, things never practiced in such closed and cold household. I talked of how I can not keep on living in a home without conversations and minimal interactions, and how gathering for mother's day becomes so performative without substantial care for each other's wellbeing... I explained how for me and my love languages: moving furniture and taking out the trash is not caring conversations or substantial support but transactional duties of care. I apologized again for my affects on the environment and said that it is also not my place to push for such changes after all that we have been through. I offered to leave in the next few days instead of waiting to find a place, for my own sanity/safety and theirs...

          My brother then finally opened up, admitting that he often doesn't know how to help/support me, especially when encountering socio-political/sexual/physical injustices. I appreciated that and thanked him, with my mother still weeping in silence, I asked her: has anyone ever told you while growing up that whatever you're feeling/thinking is valid, that you are allowed/freed to let it out ? My mother shook her head in silence, sobbing, and thats when I had to hold her hand tight, to feel the mothers/sisters that have came before, and survived... even in silence.

          I can feel the lineage of womanhood and femininity where submission becomes survival, and to be silent and serve is to be a good woman/mother/wife/daughter... I apologized and explained to my family of how I never see/accept them as violent allies of the oppressors, and I know we have not had an easy journey either; however, I am afraid/angry of ways we don't challenge our systematic beliefs and practices, thus letting us rot comfortably with privilege. I feel the same ways when I felt fighting them to see/accept/(re/un)learn my woman/femmehood as I feel now fighting them to be aware of systematic violence and the ways we become complicit. Perhaps all for the ego too as I am no saint, how selfish of me to project such journey of awakening to those around me, pushing pain for enlightenment, it is almost scary of how cynicism becomes you... I then started to realize that I also have tendencies to isolate and somehow cope with how much I hate myself by using self-loath to push for reflection/change, for satisfaction, thus often needing a lot of emotional affirmations. I feel that it is possible I project energies of inner-shame/guilt into spaces during mental breakdowns and instabilities, especially easily to people I'm most comfortable with: my family. And though in the right spirit of awareness and at least I demand for self-elevation and collective change... but is it even real if such is not birthed through love ? 

          Making my mother cry wasn't the mother's day we've hoped/planned for, and I am trying hard to forgive myself, as I was only searching for love and healing, even if the desperate/unstable outburst is an embarrassment to my grace, at least it was with family who embraced my ugliest moments. Yet I also have learned, through forgiving myself and while writing/reflecting, that I must do better. Not to be perfect or excellent by recognition/validation, but to do/be better through love/light, to grow softer/stronger for myself and those around me, then maybe someday beyond... A storyteller trying to share stories of hurting/healing while often only hurting, who have been carrying herself in pieces trying to love and be loved but she forgets that she deserves to feel whole first, to love in full and be loved fully. Thus I realized that if we're going to heal, it must be glorious, and my inclusion/push of my family must be rooted in compassion... I asked for hugs and of how we can/will do better for each other and ourselves, that I know how much we all try and we should be proud of our journeys, no matter for survival or beyond, that we are still here, together. I thought the night would end there but I'm glad we spent the next few hours til midnight chatting/discussing on feminism from/in East Asia in honour of mother's day: with my brother sharing historic knowledges on ancient societies and structures, with me mentioning theoretical analysis of survival, representation, and power as well as revolutionary examples/possibilities, also with my mother who only listened at first but then started to contribute her ideas/thoughts in nothing but grace... not stories yet but if you listened closely, you'd hear her experiences softly through her ideologies/principals.

"At parties I point to my body and say 

This is where love comes to die. 

Welcome, come in, make yourself at home. 

Everyone laughs, they think I’m joking..."

- Warsan Shire: The House

I remember 20 years ago my mother birthed my body

I remember 5 years ago I then started birthing my essence

I remember birthing myself again and again, 

After searching/loving/hurting/breaking/rotting/(re/un)learning

Are we then not mothers of our survival/becoming ?

A flower surrendering to mother earth; saying home is where water flows, but

Isn't fluidity part of our existence and being ?

I must heal, through loving my home within, first

Letting a garden grow, so I don't give my floral petals away trying to blossom... 

"At the end of the day,

it isn't where I came from,

maybe home is somewhere

I'm going and never have been before."

- Warsan Shire

Why I Miss My Fat Body

CW/TW: mentions of mental health, violence/politics of the body... 

(fatphobia, eating disorders, transphobia, sexual violence/rape, survival sex work)

          A part of me is scared to admit, but it's true: my body has changed, not just physically, but in its essences as well. Not only that, the relationships between my body and my mind/society/beyond, have all changed also. Can a rap*d and bruised body bloom as bright again ? How can my body ever forgive me for negotiating a price, like a cheap potted houseplant desperate to be watered, even if/when it's urine... I root for sex work in all its histories/glories, but not that, not as a trans woman of colour not knowing/believing her full worth yet. And while I must acknowledge the privileges that has helped me out of and away from survival sex work, as well as the intellectual ego to dare claim my worth beyond survival... I am here: raw, broken, rotting but not dead yet, trying/growing to (un/re)learn self-care/love, to appreciate my body and all its flaws again, to be able to enjoy pleasure again without mental/emotional pain, to softly trust finally, and to safely breathe again.

          I knew I wouldn't miss being fat, not that I consider myself "thin/skinny" now only from a 3XL to XL and losing about 30 pounds, as I always knew of fatphobia and the aim/normality/glorification of slenderness in our society. Yet I still miss my fat body, especially with the years of working on self-acceptance and self-love after much violence, I miss my fat body and the weight it held back... It certainly is a practice of grace as well as maintaining my social anxiety/triggers while smiling in response to neck-cracking compliments towards my body/weight loss. I didn't realize I had lost that much weight until people started making such statements, I guess the silver-lining is that I finally get some compliments (more like an impression of approval? still toxic...) from my mother as well. What most people are not understanding/considering is the fact that weight loss is a very common/natural reality after trauma incidents, as well as serious concerns with inhabiting eating disorders. I started losing weight when I was having difficulty securing employment last summer: the financial limitations on healthy resources as well as the traumas of sexual violence from survival sex work definitely took a toll on my body (and it proves to show/feel). Also, I figured with my appetite fluctuating, (common due to mental health and feminizing hormones) that it must have been a contributing factor as well. Thus I don't celebrate my weight loss after all, and yet for the glory of my survival and in honour of its journey of changes: I continue to celebrate my body instead, not its non-consensual affects of socio-economical politics...

"I want to make love, but my hair smells of 

War and running and running."

- Warsan Shire

          Beyond missing my fatter/thicker body, I realize that it's important for me to reflect on and write about because in all honesty, I miss my body in general and whole, no matter the size. It also interests/concerns me that from interpersonal observations: I'm more able to have sex without flashbacks of past ra*e/sexual assaults with people I have less emotional connections/reliance with. I come to understand that after much violence, I have been surviving and coping by distancing/disconnecting with my body physically, spiritually, and sexually. It hurts both me and my partner(s) that I'm not ready to share deeper intimacy without being triggered yet, but at least I don't cry pleasuring myself physically anymore... Such raw confessions I force out of me like waterfalls: drowning myself in the sea of clarity and truth, rivering grace and forgiveness, meditating on healing from the inside out.

          I grew up hating my body with such internal/violent shame, then after years of (re/un)learning to love/care for my body again and preparing for its changes, external violence came and I'd say we're back to square one, but I try not to think like that anymore. To break such intergenerational/ancestral and cycling patterns of violence against femmehood, we must understand it to be a non-linear journey of cleansing grace that is only manifested through/from the light of internal/collective reflection/elevation... I must forgive myself for often false-practicing visibility of body positivity as self-love, as I know now that healing is much more than embracing the physical, but to confront the painful/emotional as well. Sharing my body without knowing its worth became comfortable, and all I had left is power without substance in its reclamation of nothingness. This journey starts with a confession: for I have shared/used my body without care, for the ways I would neglect myself of food, rest, cleaning, and for I have lost my ways with loving my body... Thus I surrender/pause/breathe/start again.

          My body: not a temple but a garden, not to be built but grown, not to be laboured but watered on; I miss fatness/fullness/wholeness, within myself that is honoured with a body in all its phases/changes. This body is not missing, not wasting, not rotting but re-seeding/planting/soiling... My garden watered/meditated with tears and prayers, like a test to patience and a practice for grace; I'll say healing takes forever but then we'll all look back and realize, that we were still blooming gloriously and ever softly all along.

Quarantine Diaries: Solitude & Solidarity

("Bedroom in Arles" #3 - Vincent Van Gogh, 1889)

CW/TW: mentions of rape, PTSD flashbacks/memories, bullying, suicidal-grey

          Glorious nights like these: where you start falling in love with solitude, when you honour the unheard in solidarity by listening, by feeling, by holding yourself tighter - softer - holier, when you start to fill yourself with grace while surrendering to the light of uncertainty... How trees, are teaching ways of healing and patience, as kindness is a practice and love is too; all but a peaceful practice of breathing.

          Back at my mom's house in the rural suburbs, the home I survived throughout middle-school and high school, my room the same as this blog, so full of memories of my past and becoming. At least I'm no longer sleeping on a mattress where I was rap*d on in a cold, dark basement room somewhere outside the city, where I would also routinely place my tight twin-sized mattress in a corner to cuddle/hold myself at night.... Thus I woke up today realizing that maybe I've been having difficulty sleeping since I've been back because here in the center of my room, on a elevated, wooden bed frame: a queen-sized mattress with nowhere to hide. It's a heavy bed full of traumatic memories far too distant to be triggered by; I think I started crying myself to sleep and feeling as if rotting in bed at 12 years old... I wanted to cry when I found a suicidal-grey note I wrote at 13 about insecurities with friendships/belonging/fitting-in, experiences with bullying, and how maybe coming out as queer wasn't the best idea in school. Maybe a part of my reaction is to feel numb, but reflecting on how I've wanted to die since 12/13 years old even silences/awes my cynical/suicidal-grey self today. 20 surviving 2020: I take off award certificates off my walls and tape on photographs and artworks, recycling VOGUE magazines, Chinese self-help books and reorganizing with books by women and femmes before, of poetry and philosophy...  I am a woman (un/re)learning, practicing my worth, a flower trying to breathe/blossom, a femme softly surviving through grace despite it all.

          Solitude is not safe for a person feeling like me, and I understand that solidarity is key to the community that have helped me/us survived. "You are not alone/We are in this together" sayings serve nothing as statements of solidarity but everything as soft self-reminders to stay alive. If a flower doesn't bloom, do you blame the plant or better its soils ? Like my new resonance with my newer, more mobile and twin-sized mattress, with also how I feel like a potted houseplant: the lesson of light becomes the freedom of mobility/shape-shift, to adapt/control during change with the darkness being such constant uncertainty... The first challenge I find to loving myself in solitude is to admit that I'm scared, to surrender myself to the possibilities ahead while trusting my grace. I recall to my mother of how she would always scold me as a kid for saying that "I'm scared", I'm sure it must have connected with the queer/transphobia and how I was always told to "boy/man up, stop being a sissy about everything" while growing up, but I explain of how I find peace/power in reclaiming uncertainty and fear, that what has kept me going was to able to say: I am/was scared, but I do/did/will do it anyway.

"Feeling is Researching Feeling is integral to a Creative Practice..."

          Surviving and striving between the art of solitude and solidarity: I practice by reflecting and researching on my feelings, observing emotions as you would watch the waves meeting its shore, exploring notions of a creative/artful/meditative process without means of production but simply by being, feeling, and (re)learning/creating... I begin to realize of the love I still need to fill within, for the responsibilities of healing myself still falls on me, thus then unfolding/sharing/creating. The conflicts within seem to be often tied onto the politics of desirability, visibility, and lovability as I love/hate the complicity of my beauty/body to be desired/fetishized, the violence of my being to visible/spectacled, and the cynicism of my worth to be loved so desperately. Self-love will continue to be a rivering journey for my oceans within: Planting soft seeds and planning gardens of self-reclamation/liberation/revolution for an eternal blossom/spring.

"Wisdom is knowing I am nothing; 

Love is knowing I am everything... 

and between the two my life flows."

- Nisargadatta Maharaj

          As a sensitive/dramatic poet/lover, I find myself the need to glorify survival and healing, yet so often in reality, its peaceful, quiet/anxiety-inducing and a test of patience. Sometimes there aren't pretty words to contextualize pain, only the strive to cope and move on. And during this pandemic of uncertainty, we must remember to hold on harder/tighter/softer for those in need/at risk... Nothing but healthy/safe vibes/wishes/prayers to/for all, and let's work from our privileges to fill in the gaps of injustice while demanding/fighting/advocating/(un/re)learning in solidarity.

More Community Resources:
COVID-19: The 519 - INFORMATION AND UPDATES
COVID-19: Emergency Support Fund for Sex Workers
COVID-19 Resources for Indigenous, POC, Trans, Disabled & Undocumented Communities
SCARBOROUGH FOOD SECURITY INITIATIVE
COVID-19 Black Emergency Support Fund
#RentRelief for Immigrants During #COVID19
BLACK FOOD TORONTO: A Food Sovereignty Initiative
Covid-19 Aid for Hijra community in Bangladesh
Queer Tamils Emergency Support Fund