"my body is a hellhole and you know how i feel about hellholes" by Zøe Axemarsh (twitter). "This chapbook is about my own feelings towards the dysphoria in my body and is meant to hopefully be the only full project I focus on the topic. I'm thankful that in the present tense I can appreciate this collection as a statement to where I was at and see them for the art I believe them to be; I hope you enjoy them.". hellhole is a somewhat longer chapbook in that it comes out to about 41 pages. The design of it is very minimalist with a thin more modern font throughout. It definitely is a really personal, really frank exploration of the author's dysphoria.
It's one of those situations where you feel it really deeply, maybe almost too deeply. You can tell how much pain the writer is going through and then some. It's hard to know what to say. That doesn't mean the writing is poor or too much or disinteresting. It's really really good. In that hard way. You want to praise it but not make light of the suffering that has gone into sharing it, and the difficulties with living the life behind the words. Trans/non-cis writers all become very well versed in exploring what feels like new ways to discuss and explore their own relationships with gender and transitioning. Still, there are always those moments of reading other people's writing about it that make you go "wow" and try to sit with the actualization that someone else has pieced together. This is very much Zøe's relationship with her body and nothing and no one else can ever truly get it the way ey do. Does this mean this is "just" a gender or "just" a dysphoria book? Not at all. Even when trans people are writing about gender and transness, we are always so much more than that.
Sometimes she'll say something like "linking bodies to violence / is only natural among a population obsessed with war" and other times gift you a poem written and directed like an indie film (loved that). The story here is desperation, but one where the author either has come to terms with it or is in the process of doing so. It's hard to describe. It isn't hopeless. It's just so understandably frustrated that you know the same dull pain throughout your bones better than any other sensation at this point. There's also some really beautiful exploration of spirituality, parental or familial roles, human existence, nature, and so on. Generally a well-balanced and hard-hitting submission that shouldn't be underestimated.
"your brothers and sisters are carriers of precious knowledge some know of snakes and constellations, herbs and tides what do you know? what do you want the worthy to learn?"
[CW // dysphoria, bodies, mental health, etc]