{**18+ content**} Binding Freedom Zine (2023)

Binding Freedom

(This is an 18+ work, please DNI if under 18. The original format is a zine, so each stanza is its own page. Check out the photos for the cover art, made by yours truly.)

Ropes of black

and green

slide through

Their fingers

with the 

unimpeded grace

of the Serpent

through Eden.

Slithering

around me,

A familiar

feeling of

electric tension

builds in my

core.

The urge to resist

becomes a distant

memory as I'm

coiled into

hitched ties and 

breaths.

In tightening each 

knot, They loosen

my grip on the 

reins,

Freeing me from

the burden of

control and

conformity.

I've never felt

closer to

salvation than

when bount at the

mercy of Their

confident,

calloused hands.

What I wouldn't

give to experience

this moment for eternity.

-   -   -

If you want a physical copy of any of my zines, they're available for purchase! Email me at radiostationpet@gmail.com with the subject line "Zine Inquiry" and I'll be happy to send you as many as you'd like. 

{**18+ content**} Kadan Zine (2023)

Kadan

(This is an 18+ work, please DNI if under 18. This work is a love letter to Dragon Age: Inquisition's NPC, The Iron Bull. The original format is a zine, so each stanza is its own page. Check out the photos for the cover art, made by yours truly.)

How sweet of them 

to let me taste 

perfection at the 

convergence of 

their powerful 

thighs.

To allow me the 

honor of hearing 

them sing my 

praises with a 

vice grip on my 

horns.

The trust they 

have in me to 

finally let go.

Unburdened,

Unashamed.

What an honor it

is to be a part of

something so

primal,

So human.

They're the reason 

I wonder if I'm 

even a monster at

all.

-  -  -  

If you want a physical copy of any of my zines, they're available for purchase! Email me at radiostationpet@gmail.com with the subject line "Zine Inquiry" and I'll be happy to send you as many as you'd like. 

{**18+ content**} Attraction Zine (2023)

Attraction

(This is an 18+ work, please DNI if under 18. The original format is a zine, so each stanza is its own page. Check out the photos for the cover art, made by yours truly.)

They talk about

chisled jawlines

and shapely

thighs the way

retired dad's talk

about horsepower

and torque.

While I can

appreciate a hot

rod when one

presents itself,

I'm not looking

for a pretty

paint job.

Do their fingers

curve around their

glass or cigarette

the same way

they'd curl over

my body?

Is the diameter of

their grip similar

to that of my

tightest necklace?

Would I like to 

look up at them

from my knees,

soaking up praises

reserved for me 

and God, if she's

listening?

Does their smile

look like it would

tear into me just

as quickly as it

would moan my 

name?

-   -   -

If you want a physical copy of any of my zines, they're available for purchase! Email me at radiostationpet@gmail.com with the subject line "Zine Inquiry" and I'll be happy to send you as many as you'd like. 

Recipe For Your First Daughter (2023)

Recipe for Your First Daughter

(Best served in quiet contemplation of who she could have been, with a mix of Pride and Guilt)

Start with a firstborn daughter, layer in expectations of being the smart one, the successful one, with good grades and better manners, the only remark on her report card being “she’s brilliant, but she talks too much”

Chop off the rebellious roots, the untamed dreams, but keep the safe, stable life choices in case anyone ever needs to lean on her

Boil away any sense of individual; her life will always be in response to someone else’s needs before her own

Incorporate siblings into children she didn’t have or ask to be responsible for, but do it anyway because someone has to and why not her

Simmer over years of pretending everything is fine until it boils over in the middle of an argument, in the Kwik Trip parking lot, or a staff meeting, never where it needs to and always at the worst time

Garnish with an anxiety disorder disguised as “compassion” and “empathy”

Serve cold-hearted and years too late, on Gramma’s worn-out potholders, with her same worn-out smile.

-   -   -

Published originally in Portage Lit Mag's 2023 issue. The original version can be found here: https://portagemagazine.org/recipe-for-your-first-daughter/

Release Your Inner Femmonster (2023)

RELEASE YOUR INNER FEMMONSTER

I want to be feminine in the way that

The Sphinx is feminine

Or Baphomet, or Dionysus.

Dangerously Feminine.

Threateningly Feminine.

The kind of feminine that breaks norms

And ignores outdated opinions of what a

Body should look like or shroud themselves in.

I want to the the type of feminine that people

Tell tales about to scare little kids away from

Hot Topic and Tumblr.

"Beware the ones with the wild-colored hair

They come at night, trapping you in their 

Fishnets and stabbing you with eyeliner

Sharper than any sword."

I want to be the type of feminine that grinds all those

"Cover up" comments into the powder of their foundation.

I want to be feminine like fish scales and horse tails

Like chalcedony and lemon cakes

Like chopping wood in Demonias.

I want to be so terrifyingly feminine that no one

Ever touches me without permission again.

That my very visage is a warning,

like a poison dart frog or

Mountain Dew.

Feminine like the local cryptid,

Indescribably alluring,

A whisper in the trees calling you closer

A shiny coin at the bottom of a mountain stream.

Feminine like broken stained glass at the foot of an altar.

Feminine like a proclamation of war.

I want femininity to be a choice

Not a default setting to be assigned.

A standard of being that demands respect.

That takes up space.

That refuses to kneecap its sentences just to

Make room for others’ egos.

Whoever decided liking sparkles and pink and

expressing emotions meant I can’t

Fend for myself,

I just want to talk.

Never mind the fishnets and eyeliner,

I just want to show you

What I mean when I say

Femme fatale.

-   -   -

Published originally in Portage Lit Mag's 2023 issue. The original version can be found here: https://portagemagazine.org/release-your-inner-femmonster/

Great Expectations (2023)

Great Expectations

You’re like bubblegum stuck in my hair

I think I’ve got every trace of

You removed but there are

Days where I find more

Stuck deep in the roots or

Little bits at the edges.

I finally cut you out but now

I’m left with a jagged pixie

Cut that doesn’t suit me at all.

I shave my head, desperate to

Remove every piece of you.

Now I look in the mirror and

I’m reminded of you regardless.

How luscious I was before you

How barren I feel after.

You didn’t break my heart,

I did it for you.

You’re moving on.

I’m not your concern.

I never was.

You can continue searching that

Bottomless ocean you call a heart

For the meaning of existence without

Me to weigh you down, keep you

Grounded for fear you’ll forget to

Breathe.

You can fly as close to the sun as you want

Without me warning you of

Dripping wax.

You can burn out to your

Heart’s content.

I only ever stifled you, anyway.

Even when it’s easier to forget I exist,

I hope you remember Hay Creek.

I hope you remember the makeshift canopy fort

Silk sheets and woven wool,

White wine and gummi worm charcuterie,

Sandalwood and lavender.

I hope you remember the squishy,

Broken bits we took out of hiding and

Handled like museum quality relics

Only to shove them back in a dusty box

Left for the next moment of

Performative vulnerability.

I hope you remember the

Bargain jeans and sticker bins

Painted pottery and

Deli sandwiches in a snowy cemetery.

I hope you remember me trying to love you

Even when if felt impossible without

Divine intervention

Or an alternate universe.

I hope you find a love that fits you

Like glass shards in a mosaic

Completing the picture I wish I was a part of.

-   -   -

Published originally in Portage Lit Mag's 2023 issue. The original publication can be found here: https://portagemagazine.org/great-expectations/

Frogs (2023)

Frogs

When I was little

Before my sister was born

Before I knew much of anything about pain and suffering

My grandfather convinced me that hail was

Little white frogs

Jumping around in the grass

Never mind where they fell from,

Look how they hop when they hit the ground!

His name was Kermit,

I trusted he knew all things about frogs

The big green ones that lived in the koi pond

And scattered when I tried to catch them in my net

Or little white ones that fell from the sky

And disappeared in the afternoon sun.

I'm much older now

I know much more about pain and suffering

I've read his memoir

Learned about the miracles,

The fishhook in the eye,

The shrapnel missing his exposed body

Killing his friends through an eye slit in the bunker wall.

No one in his family lived to be 46,

but this little, stubborn old man

Frail in body but strong in wit,

Nearly doubled that age,

Refusing to be a victim of fate time and again.

I heard it all again at that church in Poysippi

Listening to the pastor read the sermon

The little old man wrote

Because of course he planned his own funeral

Writing drafts up until he couldn't hold the pen

I can't help but wonder if the perfectionism and

procrastination combination

Is genetic

Like heart disease

Or a dry sense of humor.

I find myself looking out the window

With my little sister

Telling her about the little white frogs

Look how they hop when they hit the ground!

I can't help but see that little old man

Smiling back through my reflection on the glass

And I wonder if he felt these moments

Were worth all that pain and suffering.

-   -   -   

Published originally in Portage Lit Mag's 2022 issue. The original can be found here: https://portagemagazine.org/frogs/

Home (2021)

Home

Where I’m from 

For some folks 

Is apple pie and Jesus. 

A comfortable, 

Unchallenged existence 

Filled with Bud Light, 

Cornfields, 

And dirty looks at people with colored hair 

And piercings. 

 

Home to them is avoidant. 

All scripture but no heart, 

All hate and no depth. 

 

Home to them is a place I am ashamed to be associated with. 

Me, 

With my Paganism 

And love for girls 

And boys 

And everyone in between. 

Me,  

With my “voice” 

And “opinions” 

And resistance to complacency. 

 

Home to me is boiled bones  

And tanned hides, 

Open hearts and mixed drinks. 

It’s a love that’s not conditional on  

How I spend my Sundays 

Or who I spend them with.

 

Home is all the folks 

Who don’t see their own validity 

Who pretend to be something they’re not 

Out of necessity. 

 

Home is knowing I can’t change where I come from, 

But I can change who comes from it. 

I can be the home they never got, 

Open my door to those who can’t ever go back 

Welcome them with a smile, 

A cup of tea, 

And a hug that breathes,  

 

You are allowed to exist.

-   -   -

Published originally in Portage Lit Mag's 2021 issue. The original can be found here: https://portagemagazine.org/home-4/

On Adulthood (2021)

On Adulthood

When I was 7, I thought that adulthood would be ice

cream for dinner whenever I wanted and I could read

Books all night long without being told when to turn out the light.

When I was sixteen, I thought adulthood would be living

on my own with no one to tell me I wouldn’t make it in

“the real world”.

When I was eighteen, I thought adulthood

would be selling my body to the capitalist machine and

yelling at the people I said I loved.

At twenty-three, I think adulthood is finding moments to play

farming simulator games and cuddle with my giant stuffed

duck, Chuck while eating too much cheese and ignoring

Mount Laundry on the horizon.

I think adulthood is trying to chase the high of a scholastic

bookfair. It’s trying to find that hunger for knowledge that

kept me up all night reading series after series of books.

It’s wondering why, no matter how many bubble baths I take

or times I try and fail to meditate, I can’t seem to take care of

myself long enough to remember what it is I’m working towards.

It’s wondering why I need to work towards anything in the first place. 

Adulthood is buying Funko Pops and art prints

to decorate my house that I hardly spend time in because I’m too

busy having to make money to afford my house. It’s surrounding

myself with color, sweetness, and cute creatures that remind me

there are still people out there who believe in expression, who said

fuck you to the notion that productivity is equal to validity.

It’s remembering that life happens in between obligations. It’s the

Sunday morning sunrise over Lake Winnebago that stings my

third shift eyes but feels like cotton candy on my skin.

It’s driving around the block one more time so I can listen to the

end of “Day Dreaming” because Aretha understands love is

a vulnerability but it feels so fucking nice to put the shield down.

It’s letting myself believe this sheep-haired man with

the halo irises really means it when he says he loves me. It’s

learning how to live without thinking every good thing is

actually some massive iceberg of shit under the surface.

It’s letting myself live without having to rationalize why I deserve to.

-   -   -   

Stretched -Extended Edition (2021)

Stretched

The women in my family are all thin

No, not in the physical meaning

(yes, I see you looking at my curves and double chin)

I mean that they stretch themselves like taffy

Until they're spider web thin

Desperate to wrap arms around those in pain

Desperate to cover the scrapes and bruises

Desperate to wipe away every child and partner's tears

Desperate to take away the hurt

Until there's no more left in the household

Besides her own.

We dislocate joints and break ribs

To transform ourselves into whatever tool those we love need

Saving our own tears for the moments alone

Crying into a pint of frozen custard or a glass of wine

Like a lifeline.

A bandaid on a crack in our foundations.

My mother is a fixer. She pours love and understanding over disagreements like thick, 

viscous, cough syrup, suppressing the "you don't understand"'s and the "fuck you"'s until all 

that's left is long sips of the next cocktail and a feeling that you're right even though no 

one actually said so.

I thought this was a magical skill. Even as a little kid no higher than the kitchen counter, I

remember peeking around the corner into the kitchen, listening to Dad to that growling

whisper he has when he's mad but doesn't want me to hear (I always heard). Her voice,

always a calm river, never a jagged, raised mountain of misplaced feelings like Dad's,

washes over him, putting out the embers before a fire can start.

She never said it in words, but I learned that fire was bad. Yelling was bad. Disagreements

were worse than holes punched in the walls because holes in walls can be fixed, emotional

bruises cannot.

It took a divorce, rehab, and one moment of anger with me to show me how cleansing that

fire, that difficult conversation can be.

I sit here now, wishing to feel her voice wash over me like a warm bath; wishing that she

could wrap her arms around me and take the pain I feel inside away.

If only for a moment.

I find myself longing for a love I know is deep

Not like an endless well

Deep like a root canal

Not painful for the dentist who needs the paycheck

Painful for the patient

Rakes groves into the armrests

While declining the novocaine until they pass out

Not wanting to burden the assistant with the process.

I long for a love that I need

But now can never ask for

Knowing the price she pays to give it

Knowing I am the next in line at the dentist

Knowing I am just as thin.

-   -   -

Posted originally in the 2021 issue of Portage Lit Mag. The original version can be found here: https://portagemagazine.org/stretched/