When You Put on Your Binder Smelling Like Lavender

← v21n1, Spring 2022

is the same day you call yourself by your old pronouns,

as if they were makeup you put on in the dark

or shoes that don’t pinch if you stand still

or the way you pick up the phone using your ex’s last name.

The real question is, do you wear your binder to the new hairdresser

who is Korean and might look at the picture of the bearded actor you bring in

like it’s kimchi on a hamburger, who might have a store full

of ajummas who will stare and make small efforts to whisper

or she will be like your mom, not understanding you but not hating it,

tilting her head at all she cannot name.

gender identity family

Arhm Choi Wild

Arhm Choi Wild is the author of Cut to Bloom (Write Bloody Publishing, 2020), which won the 2019 Write Bloody Prize. Their work has appeared in Barrow Street , The Massachusetts Review , Pleiades , Split this Rock , and elsewhere. They are the recipient of fellowships from Kundiman, the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing. They were a finalist for the 2020 Poetic Excellence Prize from Button Poetry. They earned an MFA in poetry from Sarah Lawrence College. They work as the director of the progressive teaching institute, and diversity coordinator at a school in New York City. Photo by Sarah Phillips