Androgyny under a Microscope

If this were the nineteenth century, I could puff on a pipe
and explode into opium, discover my True Self dancing
among the smoke rings like a sooty little ghost.
But such things aren’t done any more, not in this world
of higher science and better theories to match.
So I must settle for finding myself piecemeal, year by year,
tucked away in the pocket of a men’s brocaded purple jacket,
gymnopédies on repeat, nomenclature like ill-fitting fetish boots.
Antiquarianism is a kind of paraphilia, as heinous as
the illicit crossdresser draped in pink tulle in his wife’s closet,
and just as meticulously, shamelessly, gorgeously useless.

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