"Gun nuts," a poem

“Gun Nuts”
By = Alexander Antonin

Metal penis replacement, fatal sperm;
Must impregnate everything with death.
A more perfect rape metaphor I've not seen before,
Sex and violence all wrapped up in one.
Rape Bambi to death with your metal cock,
In the name of feeding yourself (what lies!),
But the proof of your bestiality is hanging on the wall.
You want to rape humans with your metal sperm, I know it.

Open carry a murder machine and nobody says a thing
(As long as you're white; redneck not necessary but preferred),
But carry a dildo and everyone gives you shit.
Torture and murder are rated PG,
But your own body is rated X.
Nothing more pro-life than sex, nothing less so than guns.
Puritans were the true abominations,
Their filth and rot persistent as black mold.

Murder in the name of “pro-life” is the ultimate hypocrisy;
Your own Bible gives instructions on how to perform an abortion,
But you fuckers wouldn't read to save your lives.
I knew more about your faith at 10 than you know about it now, how sad is that?
Sadder still, that I had to learn it to protect myself,
As I was literally – no shitting you – terrorized in school by “Christian” hypocrites
Who would've shot Jesus dead on sight because he was middle-eastern,
All because I wouldn't join their cult.

I'm more scared of white terrorists than I'll ever be of the brown kind.
I've never met a brown terrorist, but I pass white ones every day in the street,
Whether they terrorize with murder or with words
(And words can be scarier than guns,
Casually threatening the lives of their enemies, even those hiding in plain sight).
I don't know any victims of brown terrorism,
But everyone I know has had their lives affected by the white kind.
Everyone I know has family or coworkers who're white terrorists.

Gun nuts are the worst kind of white terrorists,
Thinking they have the right to casually threaten my life.
The fact they don't know I'm queer/trans/pagan/whatever doesn't matter;
As soon as they find out, I'm a target.
As soon as they find out, they might kill me; no joke, no exaggeration.
Open carry is a murder threat, it's terrorism;
I see a gun, I think I'm gonna die,
And they get off on my fear.

So pardon me if I won't be reasonable
With people who are consistently unreasonable and violent.
Pardon me if I won't pander to the gun nuts
With their metal penis replacements,
Terrorizing everyone around them with the threat of murder,
All because they're full of ignorance and hatred.
Pardon me if I disrespect people who consistently disrespect my existence,
Just because a gun is the only dick they can get up.

"War Wounds" poem

“War Wounds”
By = Alexander Antonin

Every time I see a practical joke, I cringe.
Every time someone laughs at someone else's pain,
I feel their pain as my own,
And I revisit past pain of my own.
They think they're being funny, I think they're being scum.
They feel amusement, I feel fear and rage.
It's just my war wounds acting up,
PTSD flashbacks from the battlefield of my childhood,
The shells and mortars and bullets of peer abuse.

Elementary school, where being different makes you a target,
Everyone declaring war on the weird kid,
Who now has to cross no-man's land for 8 hours
Before returning to the safety of the bunker.
Teachers were like non-combatant civilians on the field,
Mostly useless whether they were on your side or not;
Asking them for help only drew more enemy fire,
And some of them were traitors to the cause.

I had no brothers in arms in the trenches; it was just me.
My leaders didn't even know I was at war, at first,
And didn't provide many munitions or barbed wire when they found out.
It wasn't malice, only helplessness and ignorance;
Their economy was unprepared for war,
And they weren't on the front lines, they didn't know the stakes.
And it's hard to support the troops when they can't give you good intel,
Because they're a shell-shocked child too scared to speak.

Then, after years of safety at home, suddenly there's constant noise.
The blaring air raid siren that was my sister,
Always going off for some reason or other.
A different kind of battle, a different kind of enemy,
International war at school, civil war at home.
Supporting the troops was no longer an option,
They were too busy fighting Godzilla
To have a thought to spare for my own war.

And don't even get me started on high school!
Me: genderqueer, androgynous, publicly identified as male.
Them: Sexually harassing me, bullying me, catcalling from cars,
Getting in my personal space, touching me without consent;
All this, and sexual assault (just shy of rape) for four years.
Now I flinch at every touch, and honking cars.
Now I question every compliment, in case it's sarcastic.
Now all whispering people are talking about me,
Or so my brain tells me.

My war wounds act up, and I act out,
Lashing out at the slightest perception of enemy fire,
Making pre-emptive strikes against enemy insurgents,
When I'm not holed up in my bunker or a tank.
“Veteran of the Psychic Wars” by BÖC is my national anthem,
Because “the war still rages on and there's no end that I know,”
And “I can't say if I'm ever gonna be free,”
But their “Sole Survivor” is my “Purple Mountains Majesty.”