purchase here: Brief History of My Sex Life
Praise for Subhaga Crystal Bacon
A Brief History of My Sex Life is a poetic memoir that traverses the self: it begins in the terrain of childhood and arrives at a profound peace. Subhaga Crystal Bacon captures the complications of family inheritance while presenting the detailed richness of Americana. Beneath these deeply textured poems is an abiding search for self and an unrelenting honesty. Subhaga narrates their own story with freedom, precision, and humor: “It’s Shakespearean; I’m a man / disguised as a woman playing a boy. / What a precious, private thing it is.” A Brief History of My Sex Life reminds us that poetry has the power to investigate the innermost part of ourselves. Subhaga claims that power. “Now do you see?” they ask, “You can love what you are / without flinching.”
Jessica Cuello, author of Yours, Creature
Abecedarian of a Gender Dysphoric Childhood
As soon as I knew anything of myself, I knew that I was a
Boy, despite the ample evidence of clothing and parts to the
Contrary. I had a firm commitment to this identity:
Dressing and—within myself—being like my father at
Every turn. Weekly trips to the grocery store, always a
Family event, I wore the hand-me-down jeans and shirts
Gotten from my older brother: Johnny Tremain! and
Hung my hands from beltless loops by the thumbs.
I was sure about who I was those first ten years.
Just until puberty, when the dogma amped up, trying to
Kill off that boy in me with taunts, threats that I would
Live lonely if I stayed a tomboy. I didn’t understand what they
Meant. I had plenty of friends. It was as if they thought that
Now, at the age of ten, I was someone different than I had been,
Or maybe they had changed? Anyway, I asked for a home
Perm so I could wear my hair in a flip like the beauty contestant I loved
Quietly and with deep secrecy, a kind of drag I wore
Restlessly that summer before fifth grade. Like all acts, it was
Short-lived, and by middle school, my he was back in secret glory,
Tomboy in navy blue blazer, my shaggy bangs and desert boots
Under the requisite dress-code skirts and jumpers. I remained a
Virgin until twenty, when I gave it up to a man
Well into his thirties. I learned from him about the importance of
Xylem, wicking moisture from root to stem. I found in tame
Yards new gardens to water, save from drought.
Zipper, I wet the world like a river.
About the Author
Subhaga Crystal Bacon (they/them) is the author of five collections of poetry. In addition to A Brief History of My Sex Life, they include the Lambda Literary finalist, Transitory, 2023, winner of the BOA Editions, Ltd. Isabella Gardner Award for Poetry; Surrender of Water in Hidden Places, winner of the Red Flag Poetry Chapbook Prize, 2023, released in an expanded second edition in the summer of 2024; Blue Hunger, 2020, and Elegy with a Glass of Whiskey, winner of the A. Poulin New Poetry America Prize from BOA Editions, 2004. A Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee, Subhaga is an AWP Writer to Writer mentor and teaching artist working in schools and libraries with youth and adults, as well as private students. A Queer elder, they live with their partner, the painter, Sugandhi Katharine Barnes, and their Labradoodle, Lola, in rural north central Washington on unceded Methow land.
