r.e.m.

I woke up sobbing because God, in the form of my girlfriend, helped rest the pistol in my mouth and the last thing I heard was his laugh echoed over hers when she helped pull the trigger.

do no harm

Our medical school’s climate change lecture talked about how much disposable materials are used during surgical procedures. Months prior was the first time I fully learned about what goes into a genioplasty. That climate change lecture focused on how much waste can be generated from a breast cancer tumor removal surgery, vaginoplasties and other gender-affirming care surgeries. My first ever public poetry reading was with trans poets just weeks prior. I thought about the woman at the parking permit station who held my hand and thanked me for doing cancer research, and that she’s going to stop being scared that her remission period might be coming to an end once she confirms what’s been causing her migraines that past few months. I scrolled through Instagram and saw another major writing grant was stripped from presses I follow because they believe in keeping trans voices published. I thought about my ex-best friend, wondering about how her wife was doing and if she finally finished all her laser appointments. I raised my hand to ask a question, to make sure we weren’t saying that to save the earth, we need to restrict the amount of genioplasties that might generate forty nine blood-soaked gloves and fifteen blue shoe covers that would end up in a landfill; that suicide by gender dysphoria was the price we must pay to have enough clean water for medical trainees to use ChatGPT or Open evidence on what antibiotic they need to be prescribing their patient.