Meaningless words
spoken out of haste
are supposed to
make us feel great

I know the feeling
I too have been brushed off
like dirt
Insensitive people
Make my life a living hell

I doubt myself
Because of these gestures
I have split myself
Into 2!

Thanks, my friends
I have doubled my mind
Meet James!
Meet Tiffany!

Tiff is a sparkle girl
of only 12 years
with pigtails and skirts
the world is hers

James, music man
eternally without a tan
cast in dark shadows
and fighting turmoil

Tiff popular
James Not.

The earliest I could trace this poem was back to December of 2001, but I wrote this well before leaving Lancaster High School. I�ve said in previous issues that I wasn�t sure about my genderqueer nature until I actually was able to learn about it at DePauw. This poem, which I just found again tonight (01/10/05) was just sitting for all to read at the poetry section of neufutur.com.

I know that I used to have my transformation dreams as early as 8 or 9, where (and I�ve talked about this in earlier issues of NeuFutur and InterStitial), I wanted to turn into a Turtle or a girl. There just really wasn�t much in my High School days what would link these previous thoughts with my current genderqueer affiliation, but I believe this poem is the missing link, as it were. The way I read something like this now, it seems much more as if I had identified with the �Twin Spirit� movement at this time, without having an inkling of what it is.

The more I look back into my recent past, the more I think the kids were right when they called me a �queer�. The beatings may have sucked choad, but at least they could say that for once in their life they were right.