Nothing but Light

Observation, of that body, sacred and scared, in friction of breath, a pose of thirsty instincts and their foreshadowed obsessions, tumbling the expansive permeable body of emotions within, in time’s gaze into a present.

Fearlessness, of that body, profound and enigmatic, in pain of birth, a prose of sins respectfully lingered to transcendence, surrendering to the becoming of the other, laughing seconds with the gods.

Inspiration, of that body, manipulated and seductive, in suggestion of evolution, a truth and its tail that sigh a rest to its human disposition, refracting light thru the devil’s watch.

Remembrance, of that body, ephemeral and sublime, in acceptance of its growth, a process and its confounded maze that transpires trust, silence, and an empathic pair of eyes.

O

 Fox (They/them pronouns)
 

It fascinates me that even when someone is naked before us, we don’t always see the truth. They say the camera doesn't lie - but appearances can be deceiving, and the truth isn't always visible.  

Even here, with the marks of the binder across my chest and the braces on my limbs still fresh on my skin, I wonder how often people will see me as things that I’m not.

Since I was a child, I have been outlined by the negative space, the shadows that mark the edges. I am not white; not straight; not cis; not male; not able-bodied; not living the life that I was “supposed” to, nor even that I planned for myself before my illness changed everything…  

I sometimes say that I exist in the liminal spaces.  But the truth is simply that I exist.  And the spaces - the labels, the boxes, the binaries - are all human conceits.  We use them to make sense of the world, to find patterns we can recognise, concepts we can communicate to each other - and I’m no different, I will own that.  

But reality is broader than boxes, and exultantly defies the neat categories with which we attempt to constrain and codify.

Not limited by labels, but limned in light, I exist.

I thought my truths were bounded by things that I was expected to be (and wasn’t).  As I have grown, however, I have realised that living outside those expectations didn’t confine me, any more than it confined those who found their truths within them.  We each have our own multifaceted brilliance; I want a world where we can all shine.

And I am not sitting down, shutting up, or keeping my colours within lines that don’t fit.

I’m in these photos, and I’ve never seen them. I’ve refused to look.

Not looking is my form of liberation, my acceptance, my “body positivity.”

I’m not looking because it doesn’t matter what I see. I will find a way to hate it, so I’m not giving myself that opportunity.

And feeling this hatred would not change anything. Neither would learning to love these pictures. Because they’re not me.

I am alien invasion dreams and symphonic metal songs and heartbreak memories and Schroedinger’s cat analogies and reincarnation intuitions. I will continue to be these things no matter what these photos look like.

Does it threaten you that I feel shitty about my looks and can still function?

That my looks are so unimportant to me, I can feel bad about them and good about myself?

That's more threatening than a woman who feels good about her body. What’s more radical than body positivity? Not giving a fuck, not even enough to glance.

Because that means the tactics used to keep us down aren't working.

I'm not immune to these tactics. I hear the hatred, the disdain. And then I get up in the morning and go about my day.

And then I pose for photos and let them go online.

I don't look at them because I know how much it'd kill me, and it's not worth it.

But the same way I'll still get up and speak in front of a crowd when I can't stand the thought of them seeing me, I'll put these photos out for everyone to see when I can't dare to imagine how they look to you, can't bare to see myself from your perspective.

Please don't be one of those men who wants to reassure me I'm beautiful, who wants to smile after a job well done helping a girl feel good about herself.

Feeling good about my body is NOT feeling good about myself. And I'm not a girl.

I'm a fierce badass woman who is no less fierce or badass because I'm insecure about my looks.

Don't you dare try to comfort me. Don't you dare make me feel good about myself. Don't you dare make me feel anything.

Let me feel shitty and let me be angry because my anger is my way of observing the world.

Feeling shitty is grasping the magnitude of the violence directed toward my body and bodies like mine.

Don’t you dare take away my right to feel shitty, my right to sense my surroundings, my right to use my intelligence.

And don’t you dare fucking tell me to love my body.

My body deserves to be seen whether I love it or not, whether you love it or not.

Don’t keep women locked inside until they love their looks.

Don’t tell us we can’t live until we can step back and see ourselves from the outside and smile.

Let us be inside ourselves for once. Let us not look for once. Let us look at other people for once, because let’s talk about that.

My sexuality isn’t what I look like; it’s what I look at.

You will not find my sexuality in these images. It’s not about what faces I make or what lingerie I wear; it’s about the porn I get off to and the way my partner takes off his pants.

And that’s fucking scary to you. Because all this time, you were thinking about me taking my clothes off, weren’t you?

That may be what’s in front of you, but that doesn’t represent me.

That image is for you, not me. I don’t exist in it.

I don’t mind these pictures being here because they’re not important. I could get fat and I could get old and I could get ugly and I’d still be all the things I’ve named. You can’t find me in these images, so I didn’t even look.

You can find Suzannah on Twitter  @suzannahweiss (https://twitter.com/suzannahweiss) and website is www.suzannahweiss.com.

It's hard to put thoughts into words when your mind is an ocean, too deep to grasp. Sometimes it's easier to swallow them and write a story book inside your soul then let them swim out of your mouth.

I never thought of myself as "beautiful". Even when the world told me I was. How old I looked for my age. The endless cat calls and objectification made me even more self-conscious. I was 10 the first time I stopped eating. The first time I felt guilty about ingesting food. And 12 the first time I started cutting to try and release the anger I had inside me. I avoided mirrors at all costs. Childhood trauma and abuse hold onto parts of your insides and gnaw at them like obsessive leaches. I grew into adulthood keeping these obsessive thoughts close. Like a secret storybook only I knew the language to.

Abuse carried into my adulthood. But I survived. One day I woke up and looked into the mirror into my own eyes and told myself I am not the monster I see. And told myself I don't deserve abuse. I deserve love. And to love myself. This is my body, my scars, my rolls, my armor. Sometimes the thoughts will hit me like a lightning bolt, but I wish I could wrap my arms around my young self and tell her it will get better.

Some days are easier than others. Some days I feel more vulnerable than others. Vulnerability is one of the rawest feelings humans can feel, and also when we learn the most about ourselves. Stripped. Naked. Raw. This life painted with human connections, challenges, and so much fucking love. I think the heart is the most vulnerable part of us. Especially when you let people inside that eloquent box you've kept locked until you've found your human key.

During the photoshoot I felt that vulnerability, but that feeling turned into a strong connection with my soul, and transcended into the camera. When I first arrived at the studio, a beautiful space, the walls drowning in paintings and multicolored cloths, I met Anastasia, who immediately eased away any anxiety I previously had by making me banana pancakes and warm coffee. We talked for hours about love, sex, our lives, and the world. It was a fragile time in my life. But somehow being naked during that photo shoot allowed me to exhale words I've been too terrified to unleash. We browsed through my photos after. Her favorites were my least. She pointed out they were the most natural. I stared at my stomach rolls, and the scars on my face and legs. "Look at your eyes" she said to me. "They're telling a story". I looked past my rolls, my naked face, and in that moment a breeze of acceptance kissed me. It's okay to feel naked. Be naked. Be vulnerable. This magical complicated world we live in seems so small to us, but when you can open your eyes big enough to say I love you to it, it's the largest masterpiece I've ever seen. We are all our own masterpieces. Creating, loving, giving. We are our own paintings. Don't forget to tell yourself that. I forget too sometimes. Im a student, an artist, a lover, and a surviver. And for the first time in my life I'm beginning to fall in love with myself.

Nothing more revealing to a person than their genitalia, unless they're in the sex industry profession, I suppose, which I'm not, but we've all thought about it, haven't we?
Sexual expression is at an all time high, at least in the existence I find myself in. 
Even so, many of us hide our goods because we've been conditioned to devalue our image.
We're never good enough. Celebrities have the best esthetic parts money can rent and even they get photo-chopped and real life chopped to hide their realness.
This is my way of stepping out of that box and un-censoring my own nudity, coming out from the old city of weirdos, with its history of circle jerk nights, nudist beaches and mandatory towel requirements for nudist seating. (And btw now I see the banning of public street nudity was banned to allow for the wildly unexpected flood of techie prudes who didn't understand freedom of expression. But that story is for another day.)