Don’t dance like a girl

Don’t walk like a girl

Don’t sit like a girl

Shame, shame, shame…

Don’t talk like a girl

Don’t eat like a girl

Don’t dress like a girl

Shame, shame, shame…

Don’t think like a girl

Don’t whisper like a girl

Don’t watch like a girl

Shame, shame, shame…

Don’t laugh like a girl

Don’t cry like a girl

Don’t sleep like a girl

Shame, shame, shame…

My mother is a girl

My mother’s sister is a girl

My father’s sister is a girl

My sister is a girl

My neighbour is a girl my friend is a girl and

my toy is a girl.

And the girl comes closer to me, slides into my wardrobe, lays her head on my pillow and her waist against mine and her legs along the wall and crossed over my thoughts and her feet resting against my head.

Her eyes have the same shape and colour as my own. I called her Nadin.

The most beautiful moments were when Nadin hid herself under my transparent purple umbrella. We both hated the rain. My grandmother would have said that the rain is made up of heaven’s tears, mourning the dead. But Nadin hated the rain because she believed that it was a divinely cold shower that poured, without warning, over a person’s elegance. But we both loved my umbrella, not because it was transparent, so it could not hide secrets, but because beneath it we were closest to each other. It was where mine and Nadin’s souls melted together. I could look into her femininity, and we stepped in sync while we walked down the road. All of this happened under my transparent purple umbrella.

One evening Nadin and I came home soaked from heaven’s tears after the wind had stolen my umbrella. Like usual, Nadin disappeared as soon as we stepped into my house. I found the living room a wild jungle, the floor strewn with slippery clay, and long branches hung from the ceiling to the floor, the air filled with the screams of bloodthirsty birds. Between the trees, I saw my siblings and my father’s naked bodies. They had sunken into the clay down to their waists. Naked, they came up to me. Leaves obscured their faces but left bare their long genitals, which hanged between their legs. They set down a knife between my hands. “Kill Nadin…” they said, in the same voice.

Thick, warm blood ran down my legs, and heaven continued to cry its tears, believing Nadin had died.

Shame… shame

Don’t dance like a girl.

I will dance

Don’t move like a girl.

I will move

Don’t cover your mouth when you laugh

I will laugh

Don’t walk like a girl

I will walk swiftly.

Don’t sit like a girl

I will stand

Don’t talk like a girl

I will talk

Don’t eat like a girl

I will live

Don’t dress like a girl

Should I be naked?

Don’t think like a girl

I’ll think

Don’t whisper like a girl

I will scream

Don’t watch like a girl

I see everything

Don’t cry like a girl

I won’t cry