FOREWORD TO THE CASS REVIEW

  
FOREWORD TO THE CASS REVIEW:
AN ERASURE
       
  Dear              ,


  One of the        great           pleasures

                                                      has been      my personal          approach
  
             to your           undermining.


  I have    tried to          remain,            if only            to
  
  hamper the research.
  
  
  I have      fought
 
                        for   the   right
  
  to support              vilified                professionals –


                   but      the toxicity,      the               name-calling
  
                   makes people          afraid ,
  
  afraid to                                      openly discuss
  
  their            generous
 
                                                 binary gender
  
                                                 preservation appproach

  Afraid to          roll
                                          back on              rights to healthcare ,
  
  afraid               to        battle                trans
  
  
  bully                     t -    s   l u    rs
  
  and     other                          tran s    ex    ual          s  I  c  k  o  s …
  
  
  I mean ,
  
  I too
  
  experience                            disappointed
   
                      hormones,
  
                             l  ost within me 
                             
                                      I   am   one   of

                                      the good ones   .
  
  Based on the       evidence ,
  
  I believe                         in your        right
  
                                                    to be          buffeted

                                                                                between
  
                                               governance structures       and

                                the     distress
                                       
                                              you     deserve.

  I believe passionately         in           narrowly defined

  transgender s.

                                            You     all     need     help !

  You   might   need             care  ,    but
                                 at all levels of the system :   no .
  
  You want      to be    respected,

                                        and              believed    ?
  
                                        How about : cautious waiting lists

                                        clinical        dismay , and years of
                                        
                                        d en ial        in stead ?
  
  Based on the currently available information      (not conducted in a vacuum,
  
  no ,      really)        we do not know
                                     the ‘sweet spot’            nor
  
                        do we
  
                                             want to.

                                             
  Yours sincerely,
  



Driftwood
       
  On Sunday we make quiet plans
  with the shimmer on the waterline.
  
  In Finland there is no tide but a motion
  churns on: algae, splintered reed, sea scum
  
  all that can be held elsewhere
  will sometime come ashore.
  
  Something you say or the way you say it
  unfurls me, and I swallow:
  
  a hundred-year-old sorrow of the blood
  a twenty-year-old tremble, as the small hand
  
  learns shame, an eight-year-old lump
  in the throat in place of a ‘yes’
  
  & those past lives lapping, wet already
  sopping boots, socks, shins, I say
  
  nothing.
  
  Imagine the headline
  in the morning paper
  
  LOST: TWO WALKERS
  SWEPT OFF THE PROMENADE!!
  
  And you, remove an unremarkable shard
  of sea-worn glass and place it in your pocket
  
  like it’s the most natural thing.
  
  Some people are wave
  breakers, some withstand