handbook of normalcy

The building says: you’re welcome here

but only if you leave your real name at the door.

I unzip myself. Step out.

Hang the flesh on a nail beside the mailbox.

Someone calls it performance.

I call it Tuesday.

/ The man with a flag for a mouth says:

You are the miracle of assimilation. /

He means:

you've almost vanished correctly.

Your hair behaves. Your hunger is bilingual.

I write an essay on the kitchen table

titled: *How to love a country that keeps you as backup.*

Footnote: I mean this tenderly.

There are parks where the birds

still sing the names of forgotten lovers.

You can hear it if you press your ear

to the mouth of a payphone.

A voice says:

You’re not real unless you’re legible.

so I erase myself slowly,

like pencil graphite on wet skin.

A teacher once told me:

the body is political.

So I stopped using mine

unless it was urgent.

*

Last night, I dreamed

a hallway full of mirrors.

Each one said:

This is not your fault.

But I woke up

and society was still there—

wearing my hoodie,

asking for a cigarette,

calling me

brother, beast, border.

And I—

I answered to all of it.