Trans Substantiation, Hypertrophy, & Lunacy
Adrian Costello
__________
Trans Substantiation
You say God does not make mistakes.
So what if the mistake is yours?
Mistaking form for function, insisting
on immutability as impermanence unfolds
before us all. What if God wants this
transformation, not just mine, not just
the miracle of becoming–truly–in
this body with a kind of holy gratitude.
But also the turning of your illusions
inside out, to better see your own face,
no longer blind to your superimposition
of meanings–not God’s–but man’s
incurious failure of awe, reducing life
to the body without the animating soul.
__________
Hypertrophy
No, I don’t regret the scars,
the way my body tried too hard
to heal. Ropy thickness shines
from the overdrive of collagen
that seals me in. What they call
mutilation, I call mutability,
a trophy to honor the movement
from a haziness to something
actual. Like locating my breath
in my body for the first time
but over and over. A revelation,
something freed up, a flow
finally able to move through.
An imperfection that marks me
and anoints me with coherence
__________
Lunacy
Oh, honey.
Call us whatever;
we can’t unland
on the moon.
You can’t unsparkle
the stars.
__________
Adrian S. Costello (he/they) is a Brooklyn-based queer and trans private practice therapist recently returning to writing after a long hiatus. He received an undergraduate degree in creative writing from Oberlin College in 2001. They are currently working on a very nearly daily series since mid-November 2024 called Tiny Poems To Survive the Apocalypse, exploring themes of fascism, oligarchy, queerness and transness, connection to nature, childhood trauma, and the both/and of suffering and joy as a human being.
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