I'm not femme. This body could have been entirely different. For the first six weeks, the cluster of cells that would become me started out as female. Had that path of development continued, it would have resulted in a body that didn't generate doubt and confusion, fear and revulsion. It would have been all that people expected of a woman. But instead, the presentation of chromosomes triggered a release of hormones that diverted the path. So now, it is a body that isn't 'femme,' and as much work as I put into it, it may never truly be what I want.
But it will be something else.
This body won't be femme like 'a woman,' but femme like the swell of the ocean. Femme like the rolling crash and spray, like a tide creeping in, scrubbing away the marks of the past to start fresh.
It will be femme like a kiss to your forehead before you wake. Femme like that warm press of lips at your hairline. Like a mug of tea placed on a nightstand while you still sleep, so that when you drift to the surface, you can see the marks on the world, showing that you matter to someone.
This body won't be 'a woman' as most people see it, but it will be femme like tears that flow freely. Tears born of mirth or joy or pain. Tears that flow for many reasons, whether they're hurts deeply felt or simply because the eyes from which they sprung dared to gaze upon something beautiful, they will flow nonetheless.
It will be femme like an embrace that sags into your body, so the tips of your knees touch and form an unbroken connection all the way up to your neck. Femme like two bodies touching as closely as they can while standing, so close that you feel the tangle of your four feet crowding for the same square inch of space, all the while feeling the caress of someone's warm breath on your neck.
It won't be femme like little black cocktail dresses, like delicate little wrists, and delicate little hands with fingers that taper to delicate little points. Fingers like they were drawn for a Disney princess. But it will be femme. Femme like a mother carrying both a child and an armful of groceries up four flights of stairs. And while that little black dress may only highlight the ways in which this body isn't femme, it will still get dolled up. No matter if that dress draws attention to its too-broad shoulders or its too-long torso that turns any skirt into a scandalously short miniskirt, these shoulders and these legs will still be bared to the night. This body will still relish the warm summer evenings and the sensation of the wind playing through its mane of hair, the delight of bold-red lips, the joy of striding through the night.
This body won't be femme like an hourglass. The curves and swoops of this body will never be terribly pronounced. But it is a body that is femme, not because of its shape, but because of what I do with it. The way the muscle and sinew bunches and stretches beneath the surface when it moves. This body will be femme because of the way it dances, the way it shudders when I weep, the way it tenses when I fuck, the way it folds around another body when I gather them into my arms.
It will be femme in how it has the strength to move forward.
It will be femme in how it finds parts of itself to be proud of, to focus on instead.
It will be femme in the way it protects those around it.
It won't be femme in the way the world expects.
But it will be femme in its own way.
–S