Poem for the Day: September 6th, 2021

The Same Word by Jacques J. Rancourt

Last night I watched the drag queen’s hip-pad
drift down her leg 
                               and distort the full moon 
of her figure. By dawn you won’t recall 
how I hummed her song to you while you were 
     sleeping.
We call this a marriage, but it isn’t 
                                                           called that
     outside 
this room. It isn’t called a thing. I’ve searched for 
     a word 
that means what I mean it to - how we are a part
of the world as much as we are apart from it -

and it does not exist. Still, we make of this thing
an imitation, an effigy. Still, we make it each day 
because we exist, weary phantom, as both the 
     flesh 
and the illusion,
                           because we live together 
even if we live as a drag queen does, drawing 
applause from a world that holds her at bay. 

Jacques J. Rancourt’s Books

In the Time of PrEP by Jacques J. Rancourt

Novena by Jacques J. Rancourt

Broken Spectre: Poems (due to be released on September 14th, 2021) by Jacques J. Rancourt

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