i’m seventeen not cis/not straight ontology: negate
my first gay bar more artsy queer southside scene
we smoked cigarettes on the fire escape
lips sip bitter punch, hips and heels shift weight
leather pants, slick hair, back to wall, they lean
i’m seventeen not cis/not straight ontology: negate
at twenty, my friend (seventeen) follows me like fate
up graffiti stairs inside these walls i’ve seen
we smoked cigarettes on the fire escape
Chinese characters abandoned, that first night we’d arrived late
to a show of wigs (pink), bodies (naked), and dildos (green)
i’m seventeen not cis/not straight ontology: negate
later floods of red blue white, in back jump the gate
breathless blocks: side yards, alleys, cuts between
we smoked cigarettes on the fire escape
at twenty, again in flashing lights, I grab her hand, run—don’t wait
at twenty-one walls wiped, doors closed, but before, later still unseen
i’m seventeen not cis/not straight ontology: negate
we smoked cigarettes on the fire escape
Billie Ouellette-Howitz
Billie Ouellette-Howitz is an emerging writer whose work has appeared in a variety of magazines and literary journals including So to Speak, and Calyx. Their essay, Bent: Daughterhood Recalled Through Skin and Bone, was first-runner up for the 2019 Margarita Donnelly Prize for Prose Writing. They use fragmented and experimental literary forms to explore the intersection of brain, body, and identity. They live above a coffee shop with their cats 豆苗 and 豆花 in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Cosmic Double 