"Identity Auditions" by Paloma Killoran (Somerset County)

What a strange thing it is indeed, 
To be so far gone you don’t know
If you’re right back where you started. 

Lately I’ve been wondering after that little girl, 
The one in love with long dresses 
princesses 
and femininity. 

Now just the word alone makes me want to gag, 
tear off my skin 
to find the bleeding, bruised, confused
Faint glowing ember inside of me: truth. 

 I see her, you know. 
Growing and glowing 
fighting and falling 
All the despairs, the crushing weight she carries inside 
All the triumphs, opportunities 
I see her as she travels, achieves, becomes 
I see the one they know.  

But in the mirror, 
I still search for myself. 

I began to lose my certainty when I saw them, that April —As they danced,
muscles straining to lift, gleaming in sculpted figures— Why do I imagine myself 
Inside that shell 
Rather than “my own?”  

“People can change” they all say, 
As I scramble through the past
Searching for traces of desires, wishes, longing, truth
Scavenge only a faint hint of wondering, 
Interspersed subtly in between blatant refusals of masculinity 
What do they feel, those boys? Who are they? 
Do I want to feel that, be them, too? 

This faint, glowing ember buried deep below 
I must escape
This is a mistake
Get me 
Out. 

How strange, indeed, I move forward into it: transitioning beyond the constructed “start.”

---

Paloma Killoran is a sophomore at Maine Central Institute in Pittsfield, Maine. Paloma wrote “Identity Auditions” as a way to give voice to an inner turmoil, and believes that writing should give everyone a means to voice who they are. When not writing, Paloma dances ballet, performs, hikes the Camden Hills, bakes, reads, and dances ballet (yes, the repetition is intentional).