by: Leyelle.

The first time I grew wings, they called me a demon. They never considered it might be “okay” to call me human too—as if they hadn’t all sawed off their horns to fit into the pretty lie they’d decided to call “normal,” even if none of us could ever be anything but monsters trying to shave our fur to look “presentable.”

The second time I grew wings, I painted them with gossamer—but I was a little “too much”—“too colorful.”

The third time they called me an angel because I’d learned to lie well enough to be “good.”

© 2024. Leyelle

Leyelle is a Black-Hispanic author and poet from Maryland, USA, but raised in part in her ancestral home of the Dominican Republic. She’s the author of the Turnill prize-winning short story “Rain Dance” and the novel Damsel in the Red Dress.

Posted 7.24.2024.