Selections from Inferior Normal
By Tyler Orion
1.
I can’t stop wanting to be fire. I am stalking
myself through my ashen mind. I am waiting for
stillness. I’ve picked a thread loose and am pulling
apart the weave of my cocoon. Of course we are
birthed from salty water. Before creation there
was ocean. The border of ocean and body is a
scream that sounds like a crab ticking through sand.
I can’t stop flying, my shoes are falling off into the
sea. I didn’t know I existed until I did. For a moment
even the waves stop. I count down from ten, bite into
my finger until it is blue. My mind is so blue. I hum a
low drone in the back of my throat: there’s an earthquake
in the Atlantic that sends whales into space. I fear for
all their space. There’s too much room in the universe.
2.
I feel his zipper against the back of my thighs. When I
can’t sleep he is lying there behind me. Rubbing my
back, hot breath in my ear. He thinks he is calming
me to sleep. I never fall asleep when he is there.
Only after he leaves. I learn to make my breath sound
like I am sleeping. He still talks about how he helped
me to fall asleep. I let him think he did no harm. I forgot
these things until now. I wonder if my memory is faulty.
I wonder why I question my memory. Maybe this is why
I am scared of the dark. The door just over my shoulder,
a cheap plywood door. It opens then closes and someone
has entered. The bed depresses behind me. I am facing
the wall. I can still see the texture of the off-white paint.
I am curating my body for survival.
3.
I am haunting, hunting myself. I am almost no
longer afraid of the dark. I catch my body and
am skinning myself to find the scars on the inside.
I am poking through the muscles and bones and carefully
lifting the veins. I am sifting my blood. Pulling at teeth.
In that room behind the plywood door I left pieces
of myself. There are small piles of skin flaked off
of my body that hide in the corners under the carpet.
I don’t know who lives in that house now but they are
living with pieces of me. They are living with refuse
from an inferior body. I release my body into the empty.
I am undone by fear, the savageness of my mind.
I have not yet died from suicide. The edge keeps moving.
I am curating my body for survival.
4.
Take off my skin and drape it on a hanger in
the closet. Pull out the veins gently and lay
them on a second hanger. They will wiggle like
jellyfish arms. Collect muscles and organs into
an empty shoebox. Place the heart and brain
in their own boxes. Be gentle with the coil of
intestines. When there is only a tumble of bones
left, bury them all deep in the ground except the
finger bones. Use these for frets on a banjo.
Push the hangers along the metal rod until they
are in the furthest corner. Hear the music of metal
screeching on metal. Stack the shoe boxes in the
darkest shadows. Close the closet door. Breathe
easier knowing I have been disassembled.
Available in Limited Edition Broadsides
We are over the moon for Tyler Orion. “Selections from Inferior Normal” is their very first publicaton, and we are honored to not only publish it in our digital magazine, but in limited edition letterpress broadsides from Montpelier, Vermont’s May Day Studio.
Tyler Orion
Tyler Orion is a writer and visual artist living in rural northern Vermont. Their work looks at the relationship between queer and trans embodiment and the natural world. Orion has studied at Goddard College and the Vermont College of Fine Arts, and works at a small, independent bookstore.

ISSN
Print: 2379-9374
Online: 2373-521X
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