Almost a Guest Post

Today is a first for this blog. I would like it to have been more, but my new friend Sarah is modest and not quite ready to introduce herself to Blogistan. I am going to keep working on her on your behalf, because I am sure that she has thoughts on our condition that would benefit many here. I will just add that in our few exchanges of ideas via email I am learning more about myself.

So, while this is not quite a guest post, here is a poem by Sarah Thompson. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do, and perhaps with a word of encouragement or two we might hear more from her soon.

Halle


My imaginary friend
 
As children we cohabited quite happily.
One body, harmlessly male.
Sometimes I confused my mother.
 
After puberty it became impractical,
'She' became an exile.
Gently, persistently, demanding repatriation.
 
"Let me free, now".
In a house of girls it was easy to comply.
Dresses, skirts, tights...
 
She gave me a pleasure in sensual things,
Sharpened my sense of the absurd, made
any self-confidence feel distinctly false.
 
I buried her for 30 years, but she never gave up.
Waiting until the hormones weakened.
Until I was freer to be 'myself'.
 
She returned subtly, never attracting attention, just another
weed in a rich chaotic garden. Always rewarding me.
But she was ruthless after decades of neglect.
 
She assimilated each victory
Incrementally redefining normal.
Bangles, necklaces, handbags...
 
'He' was helpless.
He longed for me to dominate him,
I was patient but relentless.
 
That male surface, those millimetres, are just a shell.
Functional, a legacy of times past.
I made myself comfortable inside.
 
His attempts to deny me were pathetic.
I took his concentration, his awareness, his remaining confidence.
I drew, locked, his thoughts increasingly into my loop.
 
I gave him imagination, lightness, and warmth.
He enjoyed being female.
He yearned to submit.
 
Hair, mascara, nail varnish....
Between my legs just a foreign scrap of flesh,
After a bath I covered my breasts.
 
I learned to move freely.
The walk, the hands, the way I held my head.
I desired to be desired.
 
He clung on, acting for his life,
clinging to old habits.
But the battle was won.
 
The end was so easy.
My reassuring gentleness inundated defences as soggy as cardboard,
And the drowning man gave up.
 
So now there is just me.