6.13 / Queer Two

Three Poems

Pussy Fucking Fingernails

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My nails were no longer pussy fucking nails, so I bit them off. Then I put on red lipstick. I shaved just one side of my head and let my hair down. I wanted to construct a half three-piece mod suit, half body-con bunny dress, half baggy jeans, half skinny, but there were too many halves in the equation, and I once learned about fractions. I wanted to be Grace Jones and David Bowie and Lou Reed and JD Samson. To scurry about in no-man-or-woman’s land. There I’m just a bottom feeder. With too fat a bottom. I tried to disentangle androgyny from thinness and ended up masturbating out of self-loathing. That’s usually when I stroke my invisible cock. It’s invisible but big. I was dreaming about girls in thongs and ended up almost buying one online. But my invisible credit card number didn’t authenticate.


Research on the Topic of Twinks

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I tried to watch porn again. As research. Research on the topic of twinks. Drew said I would be the kind of person to know what a twink was, it was outrageous that I didn’t. But I didn’t. “What’s a twink?” I asked him. “What’s a twink?” he scoffed, “you of all people should know what a twink is.” But I didn’t. So I asked him, “what’s a twink.” And he said, “oh, you know.” But I didn’t. So I said, “no I don’t. What’s a twink?” And he said, “they’re a particular gay-twiggy, very skinny.” “Are you a twink?” I asked him-he was particularly gay, and twiggy, very skinny. “Decidedly not,” he said, “have you seen my beard?” “I guess twinks are hairless,” I said. I wish he had responded, “prepubescence often is,” so I could have distinguished between “often” and “mostly.” But he just said “indeed,” sipped Prosecco through his teeth, set his miniature glass next to a statue of the Buddha, looked downtown, and said, “you should really watch some porn.”


Gripped

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Sarah says it’s not gay if you use a strap on. I say it’s gayer. She says I’m not allowed to use “gay” in a pejorative sense with a girl’s legs wrapped around me. So she wraps her legs around me. And I am silent. For a moment. Until I comment, “that that was positive reinforcement.” And she responds, “you are positively annoying.” And she grips me. With those leg muscles people work on in the gym, making me uncomfortable. Uncomfortable both before and because they use a thigh master. Apparently “thigh master” has found its way out of my mouth, and she is laughing. No longer gripping. Because you’re never gripped by some one who you want to laugh at. And you’re always laughed at by some one who you’d like to grip. And I was thinking about the efficacy of “gripping” as a slang term for lesbian sex, which was really getting in the way of us having any.


Tracy Jeanne Rosenthal is American culture rubbernecker who’s currently pursuing an MFA at CalArts. Her writing has been published in Work Magazine and read at the Los Angeles Theater Center. It earned her a Lambda Literary Fellowship and a spot at the 2011 &Now Festival.