quenjamin

the sun shone like it knew we needed it to keep us from falling apart. we came together a family lost in grief and disbelief that someone so strong could ever really be gone. he loved. God, did he love. he was loved. God, was he loved. he was our rock the foundation on which we leaned, the steady presence the towering oak from whose acorns grew images of his greatness. he was the calm eye in the centre of the world's storm peaceful, ever-helpful ox-strong, feather-soft. he was our serene place his was a kind face a quiet giant, who sailed terrible waters with a gentle smile and he never, never stopped loving. to the end he fought brave

Sometimes I look at myself and everything's just wrong; I've got nothing where there should be stuff and random bits stuck on and there's changes happening to some parts as time's moving along but there's nothing I can do to change the way that I was born. I don't hate my body, mind, it's been good to me through life and I know some of it will be fixed with help of surgeon's knife but I need some help convincing folks I'm husband, not his wife when my voice betrays me, but to tell them could cost me my life. And I know I should be grateful to live in the time I'm in when things are moving forward and I can show the man within to doctors who

I rage because children live fearful for their lives, because our answer is always more bombs, because we think that dead children are collateral damage and that their parents deserve the despair of losing a son or daughter so precious. I storm because my peers forget that people are real and they bleed and they feel, and they cry, and they lose their will to live when babies are torn apart by a force they can't control sent by the government of a country that hates them, and they don't understand why hatred exists, what they have done in their ordinary lives to deserve it. I cry because it could so easily be my little boy raising his arms

A woman films swans swimming serenely on the lake. Her camera doesn't see the kicking feet beneath the surface; nobody sees the force the dignified creature puts in to every stroke of its huge webbed feet, propelling it across the water in a way that seems so effortless, to the casual observer. But while we see a gentle, carefree meander across a lake the swan knows pain. The swan knows the battle of endeavour, the power it must exert in order to fulfil its journey. The swan knows struggle, it knows how to push itself to painful limits and beyond in order to achieve its goal. All the watcher sees is a swan gently swimming across the water.

Nobody ever said, of me, "and those eyelashes - wasted on a boy!" but they were. One Christmas morning I awoke excited for a bright red bicycle my first, red for strength and fire; but it was pink. The little boy I was knew pink wasn't for me (though the man I became adores it) and disappointment seared through me interwoven with the guilt of the audacity of feeling disappointment. Of course, my parents hadn't known I desperately wanted a red bike. They saw their daughter and thought she was beautiful and pink suited her. Nobody ever said, of me, "What a bonny wee lad! So handsome, so strong!" but I was. When I was ten I was so desperat

I’m sorry that I let you believe the bullshit binary beliefs of cis society on sex. I’m sorry I wouldn’t let you speak up for yourself. I’m sorry that a midwife slapped your arse and declared you were a certain type of person based on what she saw between your legs. I’m sorry I let you let them dress you up like a pretty doll. Looking back, you were beautiful and I am sad for them that you never existed. I’m sorry I never told anybody that the reason all your teddy bears were boys, was because you felt closer to them, that way. I’m sorry I didn’t speak out. I’m sorry that the boy withi

The world moves and I move with it, a speck of dust on a child's globe. Silence surrounds my beating heart except birdsong through an open window, then broken by playful foxes speaking in tongues. I try to listen to the words of the universe spoken to all but seldom heard but all I hear is blood rushing in my ears in gentle thuds. Outside, the air is cool enough to dry the sweat on my brow and cleanse my aching lungs. Body unbound, I feel more free than daylight ever allows me and the hairs on my skin rustle in a gentle breeze. The universe speaks, and I crane to listen to its wisest words but I am too imperfect too human to understand