I’m feeling fabulously scandalous….

Fag

Hag

Those are two words that I would never use. Especially not in a sentence together. Well, I would never use them unless I was just published in a book of poetry with them both in the title. And guess what? I was just published in a book of poetry called :

Fag Hag –A Scandalous Chapbook of Fabulously-Codependent Poetry

The first piece I ever read by the poet Bryan Borland was published at InkNode and it's titled Fag/Hag. I fell in love with Bryan's work that day. Over time I fell in love with the joyful, mischievous and soulful man behind the work.

Bryan pulled together a group of poets by asking us to use Fag/Hag as a jumping off point for a piece of poetry touching on the very broad topic of unrequited or somehow otherwise unattainable love.

I wrote a poem about my beautiful friend Judy Clement Wall. To my delight and amazement, it's in the collection.

-j-

If I were a boy
her husband would
have to fight me

Fight me for her
time, her laugh
her unqualified exuberance

If I were a boy I would
wrestle all comers
to be the one to make her smile

But if I were a boy
she wouldn't love me anyway
she only likes older men

-j- looks extremely vanilla compared to most of the other pieces. This is not a book for the faint of heart. Some of the pieces are angry, some are raw and achingly beautiful, some are just raw.

In short, it's everything you want in a poetry collection. Pieces that break your heart, pieces that make you think, pieces that are alien and far removed from your own experience right next to pieces that resonate with you in every fiber of your being. I think my favorite piece is by Stephen S. Mills. His piece is titled "Bryan makes me write a poem about a term I don't like." Stephen's piece is a heartbreaking telling of what life for both the fag and the hag can be like, and the power that ugly words can have on the human psyche.

There's a great preview of the book HERE.

It was incredibly easy to be inspired by the dazzling life force that is -j- ; so the only thing I had to do after I wrote my poem was come up with an interesting seven word bio [which is harder than it sounds] and then be ever so grateful that I got to participate in this particular collection of very powerful and very human words.

[which I am]

Thank you Bryan.