In Another Heart

Today I’ll be somebody: a black girl,
Too slowly growing into womanhood;
An Indonesian Muslim, in a whirl
Of stark transsexual need. I’m feeling good,
Prepared for anything, darkness or light,
Forgetting, memory, lies, truth, love, hate,
Exasperation, joy — with one great bite
I claim the freedom to appropriate:
Another old Jew in his seventies
With thoughts and feelings so foreign to me
I understand a dust mote in the breeze
Better than him. It’s only poetry,
A few short moments in another heart.
So human, we can not be told apart.