I wrote this poem originally two years ago and is the title poem of my book by the same name. I have revised it rather drastically, and much more for the better. I hope it helps celebrate who we are, each other, and our future together.
Love, Jenn
Transcendencies
A Poem for the Transgender Community
by
Jennifer Angelina Petro
We are all transcendent,
Shining across space and time in clouds
Of oxygen, carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen;
Each and every one of us transcends
Something, or someone, or somehow
Or someday—just to be able to stand here
In this very moment, catching our breath,
Learning to live–
We all transcend and become—
It is as simple as that.
Our blood streams are transoceanic,
Our bodies holy translations of spirit and soul,
Transcribed onto the pages of the world
By an Author who knows us by heart and accepts us as we are.
Yes, we are transpierced with pain—
Every day just leaving our house
And wondering if we will be safe—hurts.
Yes, we have been transplanted inside
And for some the ground grows more certain with every step,
While others cannot move out of fear for their lives.
Even as we progress in small ways and big,
Through a series of seemingly never-ending transversals only to find ourselves
Transported into more hatred, ignorance,
And shadow-driven insecurities of so-called, “religious” people—
We are still here—we will not give up.
We transilluminate boundaries
That no longer have solid meaning—they never did,
We are waking up to the truth that gender
Is not fixed—it is transmigratory—and no longer the transaxle
Of a tired binary sustained by those who have never even
Taken the time to get to know their own bodies–
Let alone love, or transform them into possibilities without shame—
Even though everything about people like us is transubstantiated
By living, breathing experience and science—for here we are, and yet we are told
We do not exist—We are told we do not deserve to exist—
Even though our lives are based on real, vital, valid, individual,
And continuous transitions of body and spirit,
We are still told we are evil, perversions,
Abominations before god.
How many more of us will be murdered by transient-thinking men
Before the world decides it is one more too many?
What makes transphobic people think they can transpose
An already faulty belief system onto us to justify or rationalize
Their unjustifiable and irrational actions and laws?
Do they really think we will not fight back against their genocidal ways?
My dear trans community, let us help transport one another
And the world, into a time where transcendencies are accepted as commonplace–
It will happen despite their barbaric ideas—
We will not be transfixed by their condemning and weakening gaze—They
Who cannot think past their own shadows—they too
Will be transformed.
We are living transmissions of realities
That shine a light on their small mindedness,
And we are here to stay.
We are not here to inspire some kind
Of transcultural revolution—
We ARE a revolution—
Every time we step out into the world
We declare that infinite possibilities exist.
Jesus of the transfiguration, came to transmute those who hate
And to set their limited beliefs on fire;
Jesus came to give them a spirit-transfusion to flush out
Both their own self-loathing and their fear of us–
Those of us, steeped in beatitudes and compassion
So deep, and forged by pain and marginalization,
As to be transcribed into living testaments
Of love’s transcendent power—we will inherit the earth.
Come, haters, shed your mantles of tissue and weariness,
Shed your tired ideological transparencies, and projections,
And transmigrate with us to a way of living where Jesus reigns
Alongside the mother tree and the transdimensional angels
Singing and dancing for the freedom of all souls.
For you will transpire—perhaps sooner than you want–
Life is transonic, yes, but it is death that comes at the speed of sound—
And when it does you shall be transposed against a backdrop of light
And seen for how you really lived.
And we—
We will continue to blossom and unfurl—transcendentalists
Of power—living rainbows moving ever forward—
We will continue to be transcendencies of glory,
And revelations of truth,
We will transcend you, transmogrify you, transverse you—
We will ever be here shining a light on your hypocrisies,
And reveling in the wonder of who we are.
And my beloved trans community,
May we transcend our own limited ideas of what it means
To really be trans, may we put an end to policing one another,
And instead accept one another for our transunique journeys.
May we all join forces to transfree ourselves and one another.
For we are all transcendent,
Shining across space and time in clouds
Of oxygen, carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen;
Each and every one of us transcends
Something, or someone, or somehow
Or someday—just to be able to stand here
In this very moment, catching our breath,
Learning to live–
We all transcend and become—
It is as simple as that.
