Written by: Alejandro Bastidas
Photography by: Hailee Williams
Model Noah Swart
I long for interludes of stillness
as I stumble down the distance
between myself and the stranger’s body
I am destined to inhabit
against my will, against my nature
held hostage until my skin is paper thin,
my name stolen from the barefoot boy
running in circles in my memory
another phantom
I am summarized in a title
useful in business days only
carbon-copied creature chemically wired
to sacrifice the flexibility of the individual,
the beauty of vulnerability
What if I despise the figures of manhood
monochromatic, beaten into our psyche
with a hammer a set of instructions:
This is how to self-destruct
This is how to disappear
I forfeit the language of fear
onwards across the tightrope
still barefoot, ready to catch myself midair
