It can be difficult to spread out. To offer oneself permission to take up space. On New York City subways, men spread their legs, bang knees up against the humans on either side of them. I often find myself, pressing my thighs together, backpack on my lap, feeling like a piece of paper: crumpled. Lately, I look at these limbs of others and how they spread. Male. Female. Gender non-conforming. Transgender. There is a spectrum of bodies and there is no one way to present it.
you called my chest a slide/like a carnival ride/slid palms over the smooth and flat.
We apologize for the ways in which we walk around. Say I’m sorry when others bump into us. When we bump around inside ourselves, who do we apologize to? Spreading out is beyond just space. It is how one experiments with movement and presentation. Nothing is constant; nothing remains the same. Even maps must be revised and floor plans and weather patterns. Bodies continue to flux and should be encouraged to do so.
and in that moment of collision/our bones were genderless/we were shadows entering each other/we were a climax of vocabularies
Aimee Herman 