#radfem poetry

[terfywho]

From Mrs Tiresias

by Carol Ann Duffy

*

All I know is this:

he went out for his walk a man

and came home female.

Out the back gate with his stick,

the dog;

wearing his gardening kecks,

an open-necked shirt,

and a jacket in Harris tweed I'd patched at the elbows myself.

Whistling.

He liked to hear

the first cuckoo of spring

then write to The Times.

I'd usually heard it

days before him

but I never let on.

I'd heard one that morning

while he was asleep;

just as I heard,

at about 6 p.m.,

a faint sneer of thunder up in the woods

and felt

a sudden heat

at the back of my knees.

He was late getting back.

I was brushing my hair at the mirror

and running a bath

when a face

swam into view

next to my own.

The eyes were the same.

But in the shocking V of the shirt were breasts.

When he uttered my name in his woman's voice I passed out

*

Life has to go on.

I put it about that he was a twin

and this was his sister

come down to live

while he himself

was working abroad.

And at first I tried to be kind;

blow-drying his hair till he learnt to do it himself,

lending him clothes till he started to shop for his own,

sisterly, holding his soft new shape in my arms all night.

Then he started his period.

One week in bed.

Two doctors in.

Three painkillers four times a day.

And later

a letter

to the powers that be

demanding full-paid menstrual leave twelve weeks per year.

I see him still,

his selfish pale face peering at the moon

through the bathroom window.

The curse, he said, the curse.

Don't kiss me in public,

he snapped the next day,

I don't want folk getting the wrong idea.

It got worse.

After the split I would glimpse him

out and about,

entering glitzy restaurants

on the arms of powerful men -

though I knew for sure

there'd be nothing of that

going on

if he had his way -

or on TV

telling the women out there

how, as a woman himself,

he knew how we felt.

His flirt's smile.

The one thing he never got right

was the voice.

A cling peach slithering out from its tin.

I gritted my teeth.

And this is my lover, I said,

the one time we met

at a glittering ball

under the lights,

among tinkling glass,

and watched the way he stared

at her violet eyes,

at the blaze of her skin,

at the slow caress of her hand on the back of my neck;

and saw him picture

her bite,

her bite at the fruit of my lips,

and hear

my red wet cry in the night

as she shook his hand

saying How do you do:

and I noticed then his hands, her hands,

the clash of their sparkling rings and their painted nails.

*

@rad-by-nature @drowsy-hopes-and-dreams thanks guys for encouraging this!

[fixing-bad-posts]

A hat in society. No one is harmed As long as one can buy a hat 🎩👒

[snailsnfriends]

friendship among girls

west wind (mary oliver) / a good love (charlotte ager) / twin stars (clairel estevez) / sex education (laurie nunn) / derry girls (lisa mcgee) / water serpents (gustav kilmt) / ribs (lorde) / anne of green gables (lucy maud montgomery) / the friends (max ginsberg) / in the company of women (january gill o'neil) / graceland too (phoebe bridgers) / wicked (winnie holzman) / fleabag (phoebe waller-bridge) / silhouette (janice lobo sapigao) / x / juno (jason reitman) / black iris (leah raeder) / jennifer's body (karyn kusama) / the art of loving and losing female friends (rachel vorona cote) / clothes swap/brooklyn 2008 (hope gangloff) / mabel (becca de la rosa & maybell marten) / twin stars (clairel estevez) / friends (colin bootman) / my little pony: friendship is magic (lauren faust)

[merskrat]

Backbone 8: begging for submissions

Hey Radblr,

I am once again here asking for submissions for Backbone 8. I have started paying for cover art only, and have that covered for this edition, but if you would like to take a commission for cover art, I’m able to pay $20 and will use it in the next edition. Everyone who contributes will get a copy of the zine. I’ll link our Etsy down below, but just be aware that my printer is out of toner right now, so orders will have to hold off until that gets here. We will have t-shirts posted in the shop by mid-June. If you have any writing or art you would like to see in print, please hit me up! And if you’d like to support us, please buy a zine, and keep eyes for the shirts! I would love to put out a late summer edition if I can collect enough submissions. Please share this around so more women can see it! My main goal is and always has been to get women’s writing and art out there, and keep the magic of zine making alive in the digital age (although we are beginning to have pdf versions available for international readers who don’t want to pay shipping). Please help me keep this project going by submitting, buying a zine, or even just sharing this post! We have been going strong since 2019 when I first joined my irl radfem group and have expanded to readers and writers from all over the world, and this zine means everything to me! (I even have Backbone tattooed across my fingers)

[daremna]

"As if anger could be a kind of vocation for some women. It is a chilly thought. The heart is dead since infancy. Unwept for let the body go."

- The Glass Essay, Anne Carson

[tothe1ighthouse]

As a little girl, I started biting my tongue,

Thinking that my prattle was hurting others.

As a woman, I learned that my silence is deadly. -by meꨄ︎

(Teach me to speak up. I want to speak for all of us)

[moonaged-girl]

The Wolf of Man

[ch3rnovyl]

girls will tell you they were the most horrible ugly fat kid ever and how they were bullied all their childhood and then show you a picture of the most beautiful angelical being you have ever seen

[autistic-and-radical]

Hello friends, I know I haven't been active on here lately and well my page is kinda dead. Still, I'm curious, would you be interested in a blog dedicated to poetry? Not only about feminism, obviously, but just a page with my poetry and since my past experiences not only affect my views as a radical feminist but also affect my poetry so these two are kinda tied together.

[cloud-enigma-blog]

Call me a bigot, I don't care

They're all still men, in women's underwear.

The AGPs, we just can't please.

From a stone, they want blood to squeeze.

My blood, your blood, it's all fine, you see.

As long as you're not talking about menses.

[fixing-bad-posts]

kink-shaming is the worst y'all 😭💀 #radical feminism please die

[forthreedays]

A few years back there was this big push to have 'partner' used as common language. The reasoning was partly denote a long-term adult relationship, but it was mostly to normalise the term. The idea was, if it was used commonly by straight people then it wouldn't mean that a same sex attracted person using that term would be immediately outed when using it.

Previously, Gay people had three options:

out themselves and potentially put themselves in danger

lie about the gender of their partner

pretend they don't have a partner

Even the word partner was an outing of sorts, because it was so uncommon. But then there was this big push and straight people started to use partner -mostly straight women.

So now, I can talk about my partner without outing myself. When a customer or colleague asks what i'm doing tonight i can say "Oh, my partner's taking me out for dinner," and that won't raise alarm bells. When someone asks me out I can say, "Oh, no, I have a partner,". Most importantly, I don't have to keep her like a dirty secret.

That's a big deal for me.

But I've noticed recently this barrage of complains from people about "Ugh, straight women use this term and it always refers to their weirdy beardy boyfriend." But that was the point! That was the whole point! So what if they use it to seem cool and metrosexual? So fucking what?

"My partner's picking me up." And it's not weird or suspect because of them.

So thank you, straight women. Thank you for listening. Thank you for (at least initially) putting yourselves in the spotlight so we don't have to be. Thank you to all of you. I'm sorry that the gateposts keep getting moved, but I am so grateful for this one.

[blueraspberrycoke]

Now that I have more followers I wanted to talk about my book again. I published a book of poetry this past August and you can buy it on Amazon. It’s called A Matter of Bravery.

If you’re not sure if you want to buy it, here are a couple poems from it:

It helps me a lot. It’s only $8 USD. If you’d consider it, it would mean the absolute world to me. Thank you!

[yunglungs]

Men base most romantic relationships off sex. To think about it, every relationship I’ve had with men, started with sex, and had a very emphasised outlook on the sexual part of the relationship. Sex was ruined for me, when the very man who caressed my body and told me he loved me, while indulging in my physique, was the same man who physically abused me. The same hands that held my cheek while kissing me were the same hands used to push me to the ground. My body quickly started to reject sex. When we broke up. I tried so hard to “get back into the game”. I indulged in casual hook up culture. My body rejected it time after time. I have no interest in sex. Sex is a football field. A man's game, each party is trying to score their own goal. Pleasure and satisfaction. Except, I was never really trying to gain pleasure from sex, rather looking for validation in fulfilling a man's needs. I wasn't born like that, I wasn't born with the innate nature to appease men. I was brainwashed, from a very young age, through culture and media. “We live in a man's world, so you have to cooperate and flatter the male gaze”. The duality of men; from violence to love, from anger to lust. I don't think I'll ever entirely understand. Now that I can no longer participate in the twisted game men like to call sex, purely because it is futile, I no longer see myself as a valued participant of male connection. After all, I can no longer offer them what they all seek. It's quite sad because women are such beautifully complicated humans underneath the sex appeal. However, I don't think they have the capacity to comprehend that.

[aman1taverna]

I highly highly recommend everyone read cut by Catherine Lacey it's such a well written and bittersweet story.

[tothe1ighthouse]

Christ's piercing eyes keep me awake at night. The vulgar, sickening concept of purity repulses me to my deep core.

White gown and veil ready to be worn and white flowers ready to be held on this sultry sticky evening, the last evening of a woman’s freedom.

As saintly and clean as virgin Mary laying on the white sheets just like a lamb ready for sacrifice you bleed just like your mother told you you’d do while she was brushing your hair that one midsummer night.

- me and @deer4xo ༉‧₊˚.