Out tonight with the other extreme.
Laced in tight:
It's my all-over-body mask.
Out tonight are illusions and dreams.
You'd never know.
It's my all-over-body mask.
I'm doing everything.
I'm doing fine.
Here in a lie,
In a body not mine.
I'm doing perfectly.
I'm doing great.
Being is agony
In a fixed state.
But nobody noticed.
I tell it too well.
It's a joke in their eyes
Cos they're under a spell,
And nobody realised
Quite who it was
Standing before them-
Who they were dancing with.
Out tonight with the other extreme.
Laced in tight:
It's my all-over-body mask.
Out tonight are illusions and dreams.
You'd never know.
It's my all-over-body mask.
Author notes
This poem is about a night that I ended up clubbing with a couple of transgendered women.
I have issues with my gender identity and don't identify as female or male. To me, gender identity doesn't make much sense and doesn't feel natural or genuine, more like an act put on as a result of society's expectations. However, I choose to dress in a very feminine style. My body is very womanly and I'm aware that I look much more attractive if I emphasise this, despite feeling uncomfortable with the assumptions that this leads to about my gender identity. For a while, around the time I wrote this poem, I even went so far as to frequently wear corsets and high heels on nights out. For me, dressing in such a feminine way feels like being in drag... So does dressing like a man!
The night made me feel very strange. To me, gender identity feels like a lie, but to the people I went clubbing with it was something so sure and true that they went through all kinds of surgery, and probably took a lot of abuse, to change their sex and gender role. That is why I call them "the other extreme".
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