by Cassandra Whitaker (she/they)
Cassandra Whitaker is a trans writer living in rural Virginia. Whit’s work has been published in Michigan Quarterly Review, havehashad, Conjunctions, The Mississippi Review, and other places. Wolf Devouring A Wolf Devouring A Wolf is forthcoming from Jackleg Press in 2025. They are a member of the National Book Critics Circle. You can find Cassandra on Twitter @wattersoncass, Instagram @cassstevie, or on her website queer-the-wolf.com
Queer Love Song Loop 1
They them, my love
they them, they them,
them they, my love
as a field after a rain,
them they. My kisses
my missives, my kisses
they them. Our love
is high, they them,
As strong as stone,
they, them they, them
they them, they them,
as sure as rhyming breath
they them,
they them, so pretty,
so pretty, them they,
them they, wise
they them, they them,
them they, them they,
them they, them they,
as wise as the sun
they them, them they.
as useful as luck, them
they. My love is a breath
them they. My love is
with death, they them,
them they ➰
Reading Spam Mail From Chasers Makes Me Feel Something Sometimes
Because it is clear I am not wanted by the one I want
and I want to be wanted by one will give to me my own
body’s pleasure; who doesn’t want to feel desired
and beautiful? No one leads with “you have such a beautiful smile”
better than international chasers, hoping to woo me
into bed for as long as it takes them to realize they are satisfied
with only the idea of me, and not my real body, and move on
before giving. My need, ignored, silenced by the eyes.
The chaser, a wolfish need, a wolfish eye staring through you
to the end of their end, their pleasure rendered, ready-ing
again for some other treasure; if I am lucky he will text
throughout the afternoon, even if it is a lie, even if it is
only a moment, “hey there pretty, it’s me, from across time,
in your space, will you please play with me?”
A Question for the Three Headed Trans Oracle: How Do I Know I Am Not Just Anxiety?2
Fear is a bald face liar
is a strongbox
that does not hold
all that water
turn fear on its ear
love for love will
bring laughter
turn inside
say hello
what appears real is not
made of iron but is
water
a mind of flow
let its thoughts leak out
balloon the heart
friends friends
wave and wave
goodbye
even vapor
air’s air
a kind of fear
covering all
forgiving none
of fearing
chasing fear
as if you were
ocean
there is no
fear
A Brief History of Secrets Keeping Me Sick or Why Can’t You Be What I Want?
CW // religious abuse
I am estranged/from my body; the way my body/learned? Fire/and all fire’s children.
A man’s pant
around my neck, his breath
and my breath overlapping
as he presses
upon my shoulder. “Be
quiet. For me. Quiet.”
This is/your body/broken/for me/done in remembrance/of me,/eat. Do this/for me./Drink of my cup/poured out/for me. Do/this in remembrance/of me./This/is your body/broken by me.
Drink./From my cup./\Drink/of my remembrance. Do./This. Body./Break it./For me. “When you love something you kill it,
to show the world it is mine.” Men
holding me at four holding
a rifle, a pistol, a shotgun, aiming
my baby hands towards some living
fold of a forest.
A body
remembers what it was to be reversed.
Mother’s sense/of a body passed/ into my body. I/remember once how upset she was: wearing/shorts, entering the grocery store/with her baby, me. How ashamed/she should be for showing off her awful body. I/remember not knowing/how to say I love you./I remember wanting to hold on to her/neck.
The curious look/I gave people in the store,/as if they were going gnash my mother’s body/for being a
body.
Mother’s eyes
wolfed up all my body’s faults. God
is emptiness, a mouth devouring a mouth
devouring a mouth. I prayed
every night
to wake up a girl. I prayed
to have no body.
So southern/churches sewing and sowing/weekends, the preacher’s children, a currency/ of favor and favor/to be given, bodies,/sown with wafers and oaths, take/this body, show church father/how much you love/by touching a body; by touching/a body, touch God.
So a body is a spirit’s house. Are we
in agreement? A spirit inhabits
the body. The body wears the spirit.
The spirit of the body is its own
body? A body can inhabit
happiness and happiness can inhabit
the body. There is no thing but a body.
Where a spirit lodges, a body. Is the spirit
in agreement? Ask the body.
The body without a name, a name without
a body which is a flame without a body,
a body of flame going out in a body
without a name. So name and claim a body,
which is breathing a body into flame.
I am estranged/from my body; the way my body/learned? Fire/and all fire’s children. To accept/the gift that is the spirit/that wears the body/is a gift doubled, to grow/again from a body while living/through white noise/that says I hate you/and your body and how/it makes me feel, your body./The war on one’s self,/and the war waiting/in every mouth you meet. Why can’t you be/what I want?