This selection is included in NonBinary Review #17, available here.

There will be no
pain. A light pres-
sure (lighter than
a thumb) behind

the temples – that’s
all there is to
it. No curved lines.
No blurs. Just end-

less rows of Eu-
clidian per-
fection: that is
to say, freedom

from yourself. Hu-
manity, my dear,
is the worst sort
of prison. Each

rib is a bar
for a cage you
never asked for.
You may feel a

gentle pressure
behind the ster-
num just now. Don’t
try to fight. It

will all be o-
ver easier
if you don’t. Pic-
ture a pulsing

Yet there is music in her blood singing too loud and I am but a flute wrenched from a madman’s hands tasting metallic lips that never kiss never speak seeing red in the gray always red but not fire always rhythm not dance and my thoughts are wings I’ve never unfolded and my skull has windows I’ve never opened and I am small and I am small and I and I and and

iron lung, on-
ly we are the
lung and it breathes
for us. No i-

ron, in truth. It
is soft as eye-
lids and as qui-
et too, with smoothed

fingertips. Child,
hush now. Let the
singing fade. All
this I shall give.

Yet there is music in her blood singing too loud and I am but a flute wrenched from a madman’s hands tasting metallic lips that never kiss never speak seeing red in the gray always red but not fire always rhythm not dance and my thoughts in are wings I’ve never unfolded and my skull has windows I’ve never opened and I am small and I am small and I and I and and

Desirae Terrien lives in California, where she earned her B.A. and will soon begin graduate school. When she is not reading or writing, she can usually be found playing an instrument or cuddling small furry animals.