kaveh akbar, ‘calling a wolf a wolf’ // doc luben, 'love letters or suicide notes’ // @/nutnoce, tumblr // 'my body’s made of crushed little stars’, mitski // @/ojibwa, tumblr // 'spring’, mary oliver
“Butches who desire other butches are difficult to theorize in accordance with traditional lesbian imagery for writers like Rubin, Brown, and others, because the numerous social restrictions on acceptable forms of desire make it hard to come to grips with something as multiply transgressive as the butch who desires other butches. Two female bodies having sex violates the myth of “natural” heterosexuality, female bodies in men’s clothing violates gender restrictions, and female bodies in (or out of) men’s clothing having sex with each other constitutes a triple whammy. The butch-butch couple confounds all of these conventions, which is why butch-butch makes even some lesbians uncomfortable. Trish Thomas describes what can happen when a butch pursues another butch: “She wonders if I’ve mistaken her for femme…. She becomes concerned that she’s throwing off femme vibes without even knowing it…. And suddenly she gets this overwhelming urge to arm wrestle” (22). Butch-butch sexuality is constantly being assimilated back into familiar categories, as with the butch who worries Thomas must be picking up “femme vibes” or Brown’s description of butches having sex with other butches as “faggots.” Despite such overwhelming conceptual resistance, butches, unconcerned with theoretical disputes, continue to desire other butches. Look down Castro Street any Saturday evening, and you are likely to notice a number of butch couples strolling by. Visit a chic lesbian bar in San Francisco, and you are apt to see two leather-jacketed, buzz-cut young women clinging to each other on the dance floor-and they will be far from alone”
“You don’t know anyone at the party, so you don’t want to go. You don’t like cottage cheese, so you haven’t eaten it in years. This is your choice, of course, but don’t kid yourself: it’s also the flinch. Your personality is not set in stone. You may think a morning coffee is the most enjoyable thing in the world, but it’s really just a habit. Thirty days without it, and you would be fine. You think you have a soul mate, but in fact you could have had any number of spouses. You would have evolved differently, but been just as happy. You can change what you want about yourself at any time. You see yourself as someone who can’t write or play an instrument, who gives in to temptation or makes bad decisions, but that’s really not you. It’s not ingrained. It’s not your personality. Your personality is something else, something deeper than just preferences, and these details on the surface, you can change anytime you like. If it is useful to do so, you must abandon your identity and start again. Sometimes, it’s the only way.”
