SoMa Literary Review - Almost Beautiful

Almost Beautiful

By Stacy Nathaniel Jackson

I wish I had the nerve to tell her
attention wasn’t admiration/not at Post & Polk.

Magnetized, my head turned when I punched
the car’s gas pedal, beat the light.

But it was my shame,
strayed penance
sex trade dreams
underneath the double take.

Dressed to hustle at 2 p.m. semi-convincing
she caught me— an almost beautiful transsexual
in a belle of the masquerade ball kind of way

a brown diva in black shroud, fierce & fearless,
posing near the portal of an infamous tranny bar.

her presence triggered
the read of an email
“girls” were dying
from synthetic hips
titties swelled
by industrial grade
silicon

Still, guilt slid down my throat during the two
second drive of that impetuous intersection

because I fantasized
how she hid it with tape

& blocked the sound
of a mother’s weep,

her “baby’s” indelible birth sex—
a scrimshaw on her heart.

Also by Stacy Nathaniel Jackson on SoMa Literary Review:

Stall

Stacy Nathaniel Jackson is a poet and visual artist living in San Francisco. Although he is a native Californian, his legal separation from Los Angeles became final in the late eighties. For more information about Stacy, you can visit his website.