All I Have Is the Woods Inside My Head

Minerva, calm me down. I am trying
to remember the way the deer always
emerged every time I thought of them.
And how bones would surface in the dirt
at the marsh. I’m sniffing pine cones
back to the forest floor. Rubbing
fingers together to make moss. Smoking

toward the orchard where I could
never find the owl in the rotting
tree. What kind of tree? I can’t
remember! Years pass. I’m at my desk
doing a hormone shot with my
cam off, and trying to remember,
when someone in the webinar

on trans femme aesthetics says
they don’t believe anything’s
innate. I laugh (on mute), I too
have been tossing nature~nurture
in my mind, but who hasn’t? Now what
god threw up this unforgettable
sunset tonight? I step out

to the deck in my trans masc robe
because in the end, no one will
remember. All that I’ve named
has a life outside of me. On
certain days, when the humidity
is just right, I remember everything.
I regret nothing. Birch tree.