Elaine Miller
This piece was written (and accepted) for BRAZEN FEMME--Queering Femininity, an anthology that was published by Arsenal Pulp press in Fall 2002.
A Femme’s List of Incidental Skills (Or: Things This Femme Can Do)
Bake cookies. Cook a good meal. Rescue a sick or young animal. Sort laundry without overlooking the stray red sock in the white pile. Shop thriftily.
Squeeze my lover’s cock with my cunt, knowing she can feel it. Come so hard I go blind for an instant. Flirt with a woman – any kind of woman. Do high-femme. Be high femme.
Fix a wall. Work on my car. Use algebra in real life. Explain physics to a child. Read at 685 words per minute. Write much, much more slowly.
Understand that breasts, hips and soft, soft skin contain a special power. Top sadistically. Top sweetly, lovingly. Make my own whips. Write salable dyke pornography. Love unreservedly and innocently. Deal with blood. Keep my head in a terrible disaster.
Completely edit and publish a pansexual kink magazine from my desktop. Circulate that magazine. Explain it patiently to US Customs.
Pass as a man while in guy-drag. Do performance on stage. Make a grope-able soft packing-dick. Wear five inch heels for hours at a time, without grimacing where anyone can see. Ditto a tight corset and false eyelashes. Wear my jeans slung low around my hips. Strap on a dick and fuck my lover. Come from fucking her hard and slow. Take a virgin asshole smoothly, coaxingly. Drive aggressively, skillfully. Read minds. Understand.
Lie. Tell the blunt truth. Cause trouble. Trouble-shoot a computer. Make a terrible mistake. Admit it after a suitable time has passed.
Have a good working knowledge of the various sticky things to put in one’s hair. Perform the magic of theatrical make-up and gender effects. Make long hair fluffy, or curly, or wild. Using clippers, cut a nice military flat-top fade on a woman’s head.
Teach a sweet dyke how to shine my engineer boots. Make her practice first on my thigh-highs. Make her come, later. Play poker. Cuss. Cock either eyebrow. Be a Daddy. Be a daddy while still wearing lipstick.
Kiss a girl. Paint my toenails. Cry freely. Pluck eyebrows evenly. Use power tools. Grow my hair down to my butt. Play a musical instrument: trombone, guitar, keyboards, percussion. Feel the beat. Move to the beat. Dance for hours.
Plan and pack for a trip. Plan and pack for a scene. Set up camp in sub-zero weather. Cook over a fire. Sharpen a knife. Wield a scalpel. Fist her. Take a fist. Clean a wound. Kiss it better. Make ‘em laugh. Make ‘em cry. Lift weights. Pick up girls. Wrestle. Win.
