Annalisa Hansford

when a cis person asks me if trans people are birthed from tenderness or violence, i tell them

Second Place, Category 2: Ages 19-25

we were wounded-born. created from the bruises

of the living. we feasted on the dying & the decaying.

the expiring & the exhaling. we were the birth of the

boneless. owing our breaths to disease and the desire

to overcome it. to flourish, we overdose on violence.

and isn’t that just another word for nature: grass blades,

blood moons, a murder of crows. and what is a name,

if not an assumption. can a hurt be named without

lungs or language. because what is a name, if not a

possession. like violets, we are an echo of all the

people we hurt. kneeling for a violence instead of

a god, we wounded our flesh before the sins could.

This poem came out of me completely subconsciously, and remained untitled for quite some time because I was unsure of what meaning lay beneath my words. But as I re-read the last part of this poem, I was reminded of how trans people are constantly policed by religious people, being told “God” doesn’t make mistakes when he creates people. These people fail to recognize that not everyone believes in their “God”, and their discrimination should not be justified by their religion. For every trans and non-binary person out there, this one’s for you.

Annalisa Hansford (they/them) is an INFP, libra, and rising sophomore at Emerson College. Their work appears or is forthcoming in Emerge Literary Journal, The Hearth Magazine, Eunoia Review, The Aurora Journal, Celestite Poetry, Lavender Bones and Violet Indigo Blue, Etc. They read for The Emerson Review and Concrete Literary Magazine. In their free time, they enjoy listening to Gracie Abrams and drinking iced vanilla matcha lattes.