JC Alfier
Between Concealer and Desire, or The First Time a Makeup Artist Regards Me Credibly
You knew damn well
what the cis ghost would say:
Where do you even start with all this shit?
But fuck that doubter,
ignore his refrain
sung from a deadnamed shadow.
I’ll let this florid spectrum
of brand names,
once peripheral at best,
consume me now
each one a hawker to fortune me
with soft convictions:
unguessed colors,
shades not found in nature,
but hungry for skin nonetheless:
rouge and shadow,
powder and paste
the legend of a map my flesh must learn:—
a thousand names for a face.
But when does a face belong?
Let’s say it belongs when I sanction
the artist
to make me the next woman
called to the sweet ache of strip-lights
that frame her mirror,
to lure reflection into song:—
changeling in blush,
concealer,
eyeshadow,
and that lipstick
named a deadly scarlet,
my mouth brimmed
with a promise, the kind
that abides no remit.
The kind that pledges
to lure a target
easy enough to kiss.
Transwoman Retreats to a Place Thought Popular off Bourbon Street
If I gaze toward the end of the barroom
most in need of light
a recently emptied and stranded shotglass
holds a strayed hornet that will go airborne
again if I can furrow the crowd to swirl the fading ice
and pitch the watery mix
into the funk of the sweat-rhythmed street
I know she may yet survive
breaking moonlight over her wings.
This piece was originally published at Noon Poetry Magazine, Fall 2024.
JC Alfier’s (they/them) most recent book of poetry is The Shadow Field. Journal credits include Copper Nickel, Faultline, Fugue, Notre Dame Review, Penn Review, River Styx, and Vassar Review. They are also a collage artist after the styles of Francesca Woodman, Deborah Turbeville, and Katrien De Blauwer.
