i want to tell you

imagine a world without gender
a world where we are not confined
to the arbitrary interpretations of
an inexact biology. imagine we could
rise above the places
below our waists, reside instead in
graceful hands, in angled cheekbones
in some deeper conception than this
skewed perception of you.

I strip myself bare of unforgiving flesh,
squinting behind dim caverns of girl parts--
what are girl parts? all we have are beating
hearts.

I sit inside this trembling body, shoulder
to hunched shoulder,
stacks of bones too unsure
to be brave enough to tell you that
my gender will never fit on the plastic sign
above a bathroom door.

and I've never filled out a single
form where they didn't ask me for
me to choose one or the other,
sister or brother, father or
mother, i want to tell you but
I'm slipping between sidewalk cracks

walking down the street hearing wolf whistles and
I want to tell you please don't read between
the lines, erase the goddamn
lines, this has nothing to do with
lines.

and I want to tell you how
when I grow up, I want to be an astronaut,
because in space breasts do not matter
in space pink and blue don't matter, space suits
are white. but here alone, between the bathroom
doors I need to make a choice.
I want to tell you but instead I will
hide here a little longer,
paint my shoulder blades pink,
let my heart beat
girl into my veins,
even though I don't believe
it, even though I want to tell you.