For my Jo
They craved transformation,
obsessed on it. Tits flattened in
mirrors by hands, in clothes by binders,
in nightmares—with a kitchen knife, skin-
ned down to their ribs, plum-melons lopped
off for some man’s breakfast, carving desperately
toward a life without breasts. Freedom can look like
violence at first. I’d describe them now as young Far-
row meets auburn Justin. Mia-boy. Bieber-honey. That
they were okay more than not “before” was something
I desperately wanted to believe. But after top surgery,
in the back of the speeding cab, feeling every
pothole in New York City, I knew that hadn’t
been true. If you could have seen their joy—
–
Alyson Gold Weinberg is the author of Bellow & Hiss, A New Women’s Voices finalist, forthcoming in September, 2023 (Finishing Line Press). Her poetry has appeared in december, Poetica, Movable Type, among others. She is a 2021 Jeff Marks Memorial Prize finalist (judged by Carl Phillips) and a 2022 Harbor Review Jewish Women’s Poetry Prize Finalist. She is the ghostwriter of five non-fiction books and the play, Object Relations.
© 2023, Alyson Gold Weinberg
Halfway Down the Stairs 