carapleym thewayyoushouldalwayshave lovedyourself

The sharp edged feathers and cutting liner kills me.

It’s ferocity more than beauty but that’s what makes it stunning, in the truest sense of the word. It took my breath away.

I remember the first drag performance where I ended up doing improv on stage and it was so fucking freeing but I looked down at myself sadly with my twee day dresses and faded hair, what the fuck was I doing there amongst all that glamour and intoxicating glitter? The air was thick with it, embedding in my lungs like wings waiting to take flight.

It was another three years before I caught on fire, saw my skin as a canvas not for another but for a new identity. Every damn day if I wanted to.

I remember the first day I tried to leave the house with overdrawn lips and a shimmering cleavage, it’s ridiculous but I felt ashamed and small, I wasn’t big enough to pull this off. How could I dare to be loud with a voice so quiet from my trauma choked tongue? Then I watched her. Iconic, bold, unfiltered. How to be unafraid of the weight of her earrings?

Little did I know how a leaden choker could unlock my soul. How I could pour out a relentless kind of love with hair so perfectly wild, how could anyone deny her?

The first time I looked in the mirror and saw hope, it was cloaked in vicious black and harsh metallic, gothic and frantic and fucking beautiful.

I stole the ashes from my own urn and tossed them across my body, a reminder to create art from your very bones, sow your heartstrings into tapestries that play across your skin, tight and longing, the way you should have always loved yourself.

Content Warning: Includes mentions of suicide and gun violence

You bewitch me Theresa/Gia

That afternoon when my brother – cousin and I found red trails reconstructing – the last few moments in the kitchen – but that was not – where she shot herself in the bathroom – next to your makeup

Our love was unknown

I was a child And there was all too much abuse around us

Her powers limited but – extravagant – her tools eyelash curlers – a mirrored walk-in closet – replete with sequined gowns – Her firm knowledge of party drugs and 80's daytime television – a gunshot on Dynasty old young Decadent! female male Who gives a shit!

She rode style for life – There was Studio 54 – beautiful but gay – a tongue – forefinger – up his ass – He’s yours! Try leather thongs – poppers – blue feather boas – pink plastic phalluses

Clip Vidal Sassoon hair advertisements – Wear v-shaped magenta dresses teased hair – rhinestones – below your breasts – a compass rose – in black and white shimmer – and red lips always red lips on the path of interpreting post-traumatic stress disorder

She needed blood – not suntan oil – mineral water – not predator prints just in time – for Falling – ill – It’s like it never happened – shooting – snorting up fucking your way to the top –She was on the cover of Vogue – once upon a time maybe a week – two she’ll get better – she won’t pass like this –not like this – alright – fine – She had Cosmo on the floor

After she passed she visited my bedroom three times and said everything must pass She was okay The hole in her head dark with oxidation a Kaposi’s sarcoma