Girl Work
After Grey Vild
Most of them tell me I’m pretty. The first man grabs me rough but fucks like he’s afraid of something breaking. Another has a patchy beard and says how special and underappreciated I am. It must just kill you, he says. The one on Tinder asks if I have a working cock. The ones under the bridge in undergrad just tell me to suck them off and rub their crotches as they say so. The one with muttonchops was obnoxious, but his friends were cute. I’m pretty sure at least three of them are girls now. I pass out when the one with the greying beard is inside of me, but he holds me afterward, which is chill. Another one insists on fucking only to the Greatest Hits of Tom Petty. Isn’t there anything else you can put on, I ask, as he cums into a sock. The turtleneck one is super excited to show off his top surgery, and whimpers during orgasm. The one with the weird goatee cries before he comes, I still regret not asking why. He smells like lavender, and had a guest bathrobe the color of sunlight. Now it’s winter. Now it’s summer. Now it’s summer again. The one from OKCupid only wants me for a threesome with his girlfriend, but I still say maybe. I don’t know what I want, but have I ever? The car roof is down and my partner’s driving, stereo playing Tom Petty— Full Moon Fever. We’re both in sundresses and Tom is singing, I-I-I-I’m depending on you. The one I met for drinks takes me back to his place and then sits on his futon for hours. A breeze stirs the car. My partner is good to me. The weather is in the eighties. She brushes the hair from my face, and lets me stop for water when I need it. I am only doing this because I want to. Your lips taste like peppermint.
Girl Work
As a child I knew the joy of home
An owl, a possum, a lizard
Dead boy on his bicycle The gifts of our little land
That boy could be you my father said on his bicycle and my joy dribbled out
Listen: we had a small house Were normal Changed clothes regularly
The first man who told me you are safe changed my clothes regularly
Was my father
Was a good man
Was just doing what he was supposed to
When I turned twelve he said oh you’re grown strung up a punching bag in the garage to girl me into
1) the swampland
2) our neighbor’s lawn
3) my muscles soft and slick
My father was good
Did what he was supposed to
The swamp’s gifts everywhere Boys watching the rot of it all
Listen This is what I did
I worked
Zefyr Lisowski is a trans Southerner and Pisces bitch living in New York City. She’s a poetry co-editor at Apogee Journal and the author of Blood Box (Black Lawrence Press, 2019). Her work has appeared in Waxwing, The Offing, The Rumpus, and elsewhere; she lives online at zeflisowski.com.