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  • Issue #27 Spring 2024
    • Issue #27 Art Spring 2024 >
      • Kristina Erny Spring 2024
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      • Marsha Solomon Spring 2024
    • Issue #27 Poetry Spring 2024 >
      • Terry Belew Spring 2024
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      • Charlie Coleman Spring 2024
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      • Beth Sherman Spring 2024
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      • Liza Olson Spring 2024
  • Issue #28 Fall 2024
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      • Eric Calloway Fall 2024
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      • JooLee Kang Fall 2024
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      • Clayre Benzadón Fall 2024
      • Catherine Broadwall Fall 2024
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      • Sarah Jack Fall 2024
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      • Wendy Wisner Fall 2024
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    • Issue #28 Fiction Fall 2024 >
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  • Issue #29 Spring 2025
    • Issue #29 Art Spring 2025 >
      • Irina Greciuhina Spring 2025
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    • Issue #29 Poetry Spring 2025 >
      • Deborah Bacharach Spring 2025
      • Diego Báez Spring 2025
      • Jaswinder Bolina Spring 2025
      • ​Ash Bowen Spring 2025
      • Christian J. Collier Spring 2025
      • ​Shou Jie Eng Spring 2025
      • Sara Fitzpatrick Spring 2025
      • Matthew Gilbert Spring 2025
      • Tammy C. Greenwood Spring 2025
      • Alejandra Hernández ​Spring 2025
      • Ben Kline ​Spring 2025
      • ​David Moolten Spring 2025
      • ​Tamer Mostafa Spring 2025
      • ​Rongfei Mu Spring 2025
      • Cynthia Neely Spring 2025
      • Pablo Otavalo Spring 2025
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      • JM Huscher Spring 2025
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Cori Bratby-Rudd

The nothing known as a stranger on a plane


​There’s a little girl alone on a plane

& she sits next to a man who does
not touch her.

This is called a dream. Or
a redo. Or a fallacy.

In this scenario the little girl has
the window seat. One palm, flat and stretched, dances
& she mimics the movement
of the plane, of
her body.

The girl’s other hand is pressed
to the window as they
go through clouds and over the sea.

It’s like a book. A movie. It’s made for children.

She feels possibility. Looking down
she imagines a whale about to dive. Imagines a sea
urchin. Imagines what the air will taste like
when she lands.

The man sits next to her & the two are neutral
the way objectivity
pretends to be. Neutral like a church wafer
bought in bulk as a snack.
& they just sit there
like they were supposed to. Like the movies say
they were supposed to.
hands in in his own lap
like he is supposed to.
& when they land, the girl is still smiling
like she is supposed to.


FAQ: What's it like to have lesbian moms (for those of you who don't)


Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: First of all, it’s that question
on monochrome monotone
repeat all around you.
Instinctive hands over
ears won’t quiet the noise, zzzzzzzzzz
Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s sometimes changing a tiny pronoun
so you don’t have to explain
and explain and explain cause today you feel tired
or maybe your grandpa died or maybe
you’re at the DMV and you don’t want the
line to take even longer
but whatever the
reason you just don’t want to be an
experiment or someone’s shock
or the basis of a stranger’s
entire political viewpoint today.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s being nine years old and your mom offering
to take you to the father
daughter dance and saying yes because you are
afraid you will hurt her or you are afraid
crying will confirm that you are missing
something, which will result in the side effect of
some DCFS man in a black suit knocking at the
door to take you because you said
it’s hard to be in a family
the world is not built around,
it’s hard to be in a family
that so many people hate.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s never growing out
of this question even though it doesn’t fit you.
Stuck in mom dialogue
you begin to wonder how long it will take
for people to stop asking.
You come to the determination that they
never will.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s having every single one of your mom’s exes at your graduation
Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s being the first in picked P.E. cause your momma knows the shit outta sports.
Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s misattributing blame. It is momentarily hating the nail when you should be mad at
the
landlord who decided to fuck up the floor, leave a wound exposed.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s a thousand strangers around you watching to make sure you don’t trip over the air,
choke on
your own spit.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s the reader’s eyes. Always watching.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s watching a strangling at a church but you are the only one who thinks of it as
murder.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s always having something to prove.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s the church, casted as the scariest monster to ever have appeared in your closet.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s having to pretend your mothers’ have no flaws. It is having to smile at a funeral.

Q:What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s being gay in the rural(est) of towns.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s hating shoes but the cement is too hot for barefoot soles.

Q: What’s it like to have lesbian moms?
A: It’s not understanding how anyone wants you, needs you to answer.


--
Cori Bratby-Rudd (she, her) is a queer LA-based writer and co-founder of Influx Collectiv(e)’s Queer Poetry Reading Series. She is the author of the chapbook Cage of Eden (Finishing Line Press, 2020) and the editor of Under The Belly of the Beast (Dissonance Press, 2020).

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  • Home
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    • Our Story
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  • Issue #27 Spring 2024
    • Issue #27 Art Spring 2024 >
      • Kristina Erny Spring 2024
      • Luiza Maia Spring 2024
      • Christy Lee Rogers Spring 2024
      • Erika Lynet Salvador Spring 2024
      • Marsha Solomon Spring 2024
    • Issue #27 Poetry Spring 2024 >
      • Terry Belew Spring 2024
      • Dustin Brookshire​ & Diamond Forde Spring 2024 Spring 2024
      • Dustin Brookshire​ & Caridad Moro-Gronlier Spring 2024 Spring 2024
      • Charlie Coleman Spring 2024
      • Isabelle Doyle Spring 2024
      • Reyzl Grace Spring 2024
      • Kelly Gray Spring 2024
      • Meredith Herndon Spring 2024
      • Mina Khan Spring 2024
      • Anoushka Kumar Spring 2024
      • Cate Latimer Spring 2024
      • BEE LB Spring 2024
      • Grace Marie Liu​ Spring 2024
      • Sarah Mills Spring 2024
      • Faisal Mohyuddin 2024
      • Marcus Myers Spring 2024
      • Mike Puican Spring 2024
      • Sarah Sorensen Spring 2024
      • Lynne Thompson Spring 2024
      • Natalie Tombasco Spring 2024
      • Alexandra van de Kamp Spring 2024
      • Donna Vorreyer Spring 2024
    • Fiction #27 Spring 2024 >
      • Bryan Betancur Spring 2024
      • Karen George Spring 2024
      • Raja'a Khalid Spring 2024
      • Riley Manning Spring 2024
      • Adina Polatsek Spring 2024
      • Beth Sherman Spring 2024
    • Nonfiction #27 Spring 2024 >
      • Liza Olson Spring 2024
  • Issue #28 Fall 2024
    • Issue #28 Art Fall 2024 >
      • Eric Calloway Fall 2024
      • Matthew Fertel Fall 2024
      • JooLee Kang Fall 2024
      • Jian Kim Fall 2024
      • Robb Kunz Fall 2024
      • Sean Layh Fall 2024
    • Issue #28 Poetry Fall 2024 >
      • Jodi Balas Fall 2024
      • Clayre Benzadón Fall 2024
      • Catherine Broadwall Fall 2024
      • Sara Burge Fall 2024
      • Judith Chalmer Fall 2024
      • Stephanie Choi Fall 2024
      • Sarah Jack Fall 2024
      • Jen Karetnick Fall 2024
      • Ae Hee Lee Fall 2024
      • Svetlana Litvinchuk Fall 2024
      • Mary Lou Buschi Fall 2024
      • Angie Macri Fall 2024
      • Gary McDowell Fall 2024
      • Sam Moe Fall 2024
      • Camille Newsom Fall 2024
      • Elizabeth O'Connell- Thompson Fall 2024
      • Olatunde Osinaike Fall 2024
      • Jessica Pierce Fall 2024
      • Diane Raptosh Fall 2024
      • Isaac Richards Fall 2024
      • Robyn Schelenz Fall 2024
      • Christopher Shipman Fall 2024
      • Alex Tretbar Fall 2024
      • Ruth Williams Fall 2024
      • Shannon K. Winston Fall 2024
      • Wendy Wisner Fall 2024
      • Anne Gerard Fall 2024
    • Issue #28 Fiction Fall 2024 >
      • J​oe Baumann Fall 2024
      • ​Morganne Howell Fall 2024
      • Matt Paczkowski Fall 2024
      • Ryan Peed Fall 2024
      • Gabriella Pitts Fall 2024
      • James Sullivan Fall 2024
  • Issue #29 Spring 2025
    • Issue #29 Art Spring 2025 >
      • Irina Greciuhina Spring 2025
      • Jesse Howard Spring 2025
      • Paul Simmons Spring 2025
      • Marsha Solomon Spring 2025
      • Elzbieta Zdunek Spring 2025
      • Na Yoon Amelia Cha-Ryu Spring 2025
    • Issue #29 Poetry Spring 2025 >
      • Deborah Bacharach Spring 2025
      • Diego Báez Spring 2025
      • Jaswinder Bolina Spring 2025
      • ​Ash Bowen Spring 2025
      • Christian J. Collier Spring 2025
      • ​Shou Jie Eng Spring 2025
      • Sara Fitzpatrick Spring 2025
      • Matthew Gilbert Spring 2025
      • Tammy C. Greenwood Spring 2025
      • Alejandra Hernández ​Spring 2025
      • Ben Kline ​Spring 2025
      • ​David Moolten Spring 2025
      • ​Tamer Mostafa Spring 2025
      • ​Rongfei Mu Spring 2025
      • Cynthia Neely Spring 2025
      • Pablo Otavalo Spring 2025
      • ​Bleah Patterson Spring 2025
      • ​M.A. Scott Spring 2025
      • ​Liam Strong ​ Spring 2025
      • Alexandra van de Kamp Spring 2025
      • ​Cassandra Whitaker Spring 2025
      • Angelique Zobitz Spring 2025
    • Issue #29 Fiction Spring 2025 >
      • Vanessa Blakeslee Spring 2025
      • K. J. Coyle Spring 2025
      • Meredith MacLeod Davidson Spring 2025
      • Jessica Mosher Spring 2025
    • Issue #29 Nonfiction Spring 2025 >
      • JM Huscher Spring 2025
      • Qurrat ul Ain Raza Abbas Spring 2025