Two Poems

Launder
after Angel Nafis

The storm.

O white cis-het man, won’t you walk a mile in my one shoe? No, no. I don’t mean take off my shoe and beat me with it! Alright, I will put on my dancing shoes and forget this ever happened. Yes, I know finger pointing is not part of the company culture. So what are we doing? Fingering or fucking? There is no finger fucking. I’m not a one trick pony. I’ve got many tricks up my sleeveless backless straight passing femme ensemble that you love to gawk at. I was born to run. I will run to my own demise. I will walk myself out of self-loathing one deliverable longer. I will talk myself into some nonsense on my own accord. No, I am not talking nonsense. I am eloquent. I have proof. I am proof. I will without remorse burn the proof in an open fire. I am the flame that lit the fire with no kindling. Without me, you are darkness coiffed in modern colonialist metaphors. 

The calm.

I gather that I am wrong but I don’t understand why I am wrong nor what right looks like

I guess she is right even though it doesn’t really make sense to me

You sound dumb when you say that

You lack confidence 

I said that because I learned in business school that certain cultures are not keen on admitting harsh truths

It’s very tough to be a white man right now

Are you keeping me in the loop? Make sure you keep me in the loop

I don’t mean to repeat what you just said. You just said that?

I’ll reach back out when I figure out what I’m talking about 

Did you cum?

*

Not a Poem 

Once my father called upon law enforcement for my institutionalization for I was hysterical he wouldn’t own up to his history of abuse 

Sometimes men want daughters who are obedient 

The police officer’s flashlight was a hallucinogen blinding my retinas assembling all white noise out of his mouth into normalcy

You can’t even make eye contact with me and that’s all I need to know to confirm you are not right 

in the head

Sometimes men assert their dominance 

The emergency room doctor said if I don’t voluntarily commit myself to the psych ward from this destination I was involuntarily brought to I will be committed against my will and that would look horrible on my medical records 

Sometimes men win negotiations 

After the voluntary paperwork two ambulance drivers smirked at one another and asked if I tried something while strapping me onto a stretcher and wheeling me away

Sometimes men are ill-suited for the jobs they have 

The doctor at the psych ward said, 

Even if you have been wronged and hurt, you wouldn’t have ended up here if you were sane

Sometimes men leave on power trips and do not return

Amatan Noor is a queer Bangladeshi Muslim poet residing in Brooklyn, whose work explores the intersections of survival, Islam, and diaspora. Her work has been published or is forthcoming on No, Dear Magazine, Stone of Madness, The South Shore Review, Thimble, and elsewhere.

Image by Daria Sannikova