Poor Unfortunate Souls
by R. Thursday
In 1891, Hans Christian Anderson was informed the man he was in love with
was getting married . . . the next day. The groom was worried Hans would make a scene, but
luckily he only absolutely justified that by reciting extended passionate poems
about the man in front of God and everyone. The bride didn't even have the decency
to be anything but lovely, so gentle, he couldn't even hate her for being with someone
Hans claimed he loved as a woman, his longing forced to be secret, that is, silent.
In 1989, I see my first movie in theatres: The Little Mermaid. Picture me
holding a minnie mouse doll, legs lost in a sequined fin, my 4-year-old frame obscured
beneath pink nylon with shiny purple shells, a smile so broad from a mouth so big
it is the widest gate to barrel an army of insults through, the softest target.
My first conviction, condemned to be labeled repeat offender.
“You talk too much.”
You know the story right? She doesn't listen. She wants a body she wasn't born with,
goes to a drag witch, sacrifices speech to be seen without drowning. It's obvious,
when you think about it. I have written so many poems apologizing
for their own noise and others where I pretend to be proud of their volume. When I cried,
my voice splintered exactly like my mother's, exactly how she earned the nickname Squeaker, a
not-gentle-enough judgment, which never stopped her from calling me
big mouth. We have always loved like oceans. Which is to say, crushingly.
Hans sent the man a handwritten original draft. The soft femme. The separated lover.
The silencing. In the first version, there is no redemption, just the fall
into the sea, just the foam and oblivion, too bleak to publish so after, the added promise
of heaven, the potential for a more real self the next go around.
I don't have long straight hair or the need to cover my chest with any shell
except what armor I choose, but when my mother asks if “losing my beautiful
voice” is a trans thing, I am on the ocean floor, barely tethered. I am afraid
if I open my mouth, the tidal pull of decades being mocked, dismissed,
indicted for the squared volume of my words will rip all the forced silences from my secret
grottos and spill them across her floor. I want
her to stop apologizing for all the witches who have shown me magic. But the question is
a conch shell curling infinitely with generational history, and it has stolen my voice.
In the story, every step on tender new legs is agony, but the mermaid dances
for the Prince anyway. We are never allowed to complain about the wreckage of getting
what we asked for, no matter who leaves us, no matter who lets the silences
swallow us in the surf.
R. Thursday (they/them) is an educator, historian, writer, and all-around nerd. When not teaching, they can be found reading, playing video games, cooking spicy dishes, or writing about monsters, queerness, comic books, space, wizards, space wizards, and on really great days, all of the above. They live in South King County, Washington, with the world's most copacetic cat.