Son/Hiding
After David Groff’s “Where is the Lady”
Why couldn’t they see the boy
I’ve been, crashing through the den,
my terrible twos donning Daddy’s Harley
riding boots & my grade school years spent
begging for swim trunks, how I hated my dress
for communion & confirmation name & the way
I covered my upper lip & chin with eyeshadow for
No Shave November which could have been just a silly
little girl thing if it wasn’t for the Whiplash percussion of
my chest & copper swirls in the sink from biting my cheek
when I had to wash it away- the first time I went into the men’s
dressing room at Kohls & put on boys joggers & a stupid Simpsons
graphic tee I cried because I’ve never felt so whole, I cried because my
thighs filled out the pants all wrong & not even a XL Giants jersey could
hide my breasts & I knew they could hardly hug a dyke much less another
son
the men in my family all walk on tippy toes; the ever natural
unnatural arch which made them record sprinters & six-foot-two
instead of six even, those prima ballerinas, those fairy footed sissy’s-
once we were French, twice scalped, three times laid ourselves on railroad
tracks outside of Lancaster & four times rised-or failed, depending on whether
you ask their momma or uncles, the men in my family don’t snitch, don’t quit, they
force themselves to crumble into the narrow shape of their fathers; belt bearers, rifle
lickers, Grumman soldiers itching to let bombs slip from their calloused hands,
fingers like sweet Italian sausage & ruptured spleens spilling manhood into
their bloodstreams, watering the family tree & despite all the willow leaves
I’ve turned I cannot find an ancestor who felt as I do, I cannot help but
wonder if they had the right idea in
hiding
Rayn Valleau a writer living in Queens, New York, where they are receiving their MFA in Poetry from City College. Rayn runs a support group for LGBTQIA+ writers titled Queer Writes- A project which aims to elevate and expand voices within the queer community. They aspire to be a Creative Writing Professor, with a focus on trans and nonbinary poetics.
The Marbled Sigh 