Seems like I kinda stepped in it with this entire intentional gender thing! Lots of comments and emails about that one.

(Almost as bad as I stepped in it when I suggested something like “I noticed your gender from across the room” as a pickup line. Yes, it sounds ridiculous. But there’s just no other way to say that without a) objectifying, and potentially offending or b) assuming a person’s gender and potentially offending. Though perhaps that’s speaking more to my underlying Issue of not wanting to offend people than it is speaking to getting someone’s attention by using gender as a flirtation device. Maybe the more appropriate line for most folks is just, “hey, I think you’re hot.”)

I think the mention of “unconscious” vs “conscious” gender are more accurate descriptors than “intentional” vs “natural” gender. I’ve already mentioned this, but: modern gender theory does not believe gender is “natural” at all, it says gender is socially constructed. It can be constructed consciously, or it can be constructed unconsciously.

But there are ways that I can be more conscious about the ways I carry myself. There are ways that I can study and understand how gender works in this highly, highly gendered society, and figure out and choose the ways I operate within it.

So, here’s a bit of a story about what that process looked like for me:

I was raised in a very feminist household. The rejection of traditional gender roles was instilled in me from very young, by my mother especially, who didn’t take my father’s name, never shaves, never wears makeup or dresses or skirts or heels, was primarily the one to mow the lawn and help me with my math homework, etc.

Though this was deep within my family values, I was particularly susceptible to cultural standards as a teenager (I think we all are, and I have some ideas about why I was in particular, but I won’t go into that here), and I ended up fairly gender-conformist, nearly married - to a cisgendered guy - for five years. I think I had to prove that for me, the model of grown-up relationships really wouldn’t work, that all that society says is actually untrue. Of course, for some people it works just fine to be female-bodied, feminine, and attracted to men - clearly, not so much for me. I think it was precisely because I suspected that this wasn’t true that I had to really prove it for myself.

I’m also firmly based in second wave feminism insofar as I believe every person’s unique life experience is valid and important. I believe each of us is already an expert on our own gender, our own lives. I believe we all have valuable, thoughtful things to add to the conversation of gender (or sexuality, or relationships) regardless of our supposed credentials or expertise or level of study.

That’s the thing about gender - we all have it, we all live in a particularly gendered society, we all have been raised with its influence.

Consciousness-raising groups (in my understanding) started for because there was no formal study of women or the female experience. (I can’t really even imagine a culture that assumed that women’s experiences were included in the male norm, a culture that had no feminist cannon, such a lack of sources to study and know and experience. Thanks, foremothers, for women studies, for feminist studies, for all the work you did!)

So C-R groups created their own sources, using the experiences of the women in the group themselves, treating each like a text, a source, from which they could learn, from which understanding could arise and blossom and grow.

This is how I see this writing project, this community, and all of you who participate and who engage with me - as part of a large consciousness-raising group, where we are all sharing ideas, resources, and experiences to gain greater understanding of our selves, our communities, and the world as a whole.

This too is where my love for narrative fiction overlaps, where reading someone else’s story enhances my understanding of the world, where I feel less separate and more connected and, ultimately, where every story has value, especially the voices to marginalized communities, experiences, bodies, and lives.

So: growing up in a feminist household with rejection of gender roles, then going out into the world and living in a hetero relationship where we were playing out very stereotypical gender roles, then coming out as queer - all this lead me to start studying feminist, queer, and gender theory, seeking out language, concepts, and similar stories to help me explain my own experiences. And within gender theory and studies, I finally found places to get some of my questions - gender roles, gender compulsivity, gender norms, gender within relationships, the intersection of sex & gender - articulated, and then answered.

Such as:

What is gender?
How does it work?
Why are we confined to a binary? Why don’t we have three or eight or fifteen genders?
How does the sex/gender binary function?
What purpose does it serve?
Who benefits? Why, how?
How does it get enforced?
How has it changed over the years?
How is it connected with race, class, sexuality, nationality, religion, etc etc?

And once I started getting ideas about how to answer these questions, I started asking more personal questions of myself, and where I fit in to this huge, permeating, practically invisible system of hierarchy, power, and value.

Such as:

How do I feel comfortable?
What makes me feel powerful?
How do I want my hair?
What looks good on my particular body?
What fits with the way I carry myself, how I treat others, how I see myself?
What type of gender am I attracted to?
How does this relate to my sexuality?

I was simultaneously starting to come into my own as butch, partly because of the lesbian initiation process of rejecting femininity and cutting off your hair (which worked for me, though certainly doesn’t work for all lesbians who go through this), and partly because I started immediately liking femmes who dated butches and who recognized a sort of masculine ‘energy’ in me.

Actually claiming the label and identity category of butch was a more difficult quest for me, one I’ve written about a few times, specifically in terms of masculine posturing and rejecting - as a feminist and lesbian - the things that I see are so problematic with compulsory masculinity in both cisgendered men and in masculine-identified women. (More on that another time.)

Regardless of my questions and hesitations about butch/femme roles and labels, the process was definitely underway. And as it has unfolded deeper and deeper, in more and more aspects of my life, I have found such a home in it, in ways that have been seriously transformative to the ways that I operate in the world.

The basic feminist principles of inherent equality, the wide range of human experience, and celebrating the self as it is are applicable to many, many aspects of gender exploration. But I’ve found that these principles aren’t quite so active in most of the lesbian communities. Yes, there are people doing this work, but we are not the majority - compulsory gender in lesbian communities is usually a sort of gender rejection, an androgyny.

And that works for many people – which is excellent! I will always say you should go with what feels good to you, what makes you feel sexy, powerful, beautiful. For many of us, it is not androgyny that makes us feel good about ourselves, it’s another type of gender expression. There’s a huge gender galaxy out there, a huge range of expression and celebration, and so much to play with.

I don’t pretend that I have all the answers to questions or issues on gender. I have concepts, ideas, and resources, and I have reached some understandings, about both the world and system at large (macro) and my own personal place within it (micro).

I also don’t think my answers will necessarily be your answers.

I encourage you to find your own answers. To ask these questions, to decide consciously where you want to be within this pervasive system.

There have been many of you who have emailed me or commented about my recent writings about conscious vs unconscious gender, and here’s the part where I start to actually take an opinion on this: I think it’s very important to discover, stumble upon, find, or create a conscious gender. Doesn’t matter how you come to it, really, but it does matter to me that we do.

What that conscious gender might look like, of course, is highly varied – perhaps all it’ll take is a moment’s consideration, and a recognition that yeah, I’m where I want to be, that’s enough for me. Maybe it’ll take years of deep exploration and personal omphaloskepsis and meditation and therapy. Maybe it’ll take reading lots of books about the subject, or lots of blogs. Maybe not.

I don’t pretend to know what that process looks like for everybody, all I know is how it looks for me – and how important it has been for me to go through that process, which is, obviously, why I am encouraging it in others.

Look, I know not everybody has the interest in this that I do. And I don’t think everyone needs to start a blog (that becomes their part-time job) and dedicate a big portion of your free time to studying how gender works and what it means to you personally, but I really do think we would begin to move forward if we have some small moments of awareness about gender, about compulsive behavior and categories, about discriminating against butches or femmes or trans folks or androgyny.

When we understand (at least a little) how the system works so that we can begin to see how we fit inside it, and we can be empowered to make the choices that are in our own best interests, rather than in the best interests of those for whom this system is designed to benefit.

But it’s not just that. It’s also because when everybody does better, then everybody does better. It’s also because sometimes I’m lonely out here doing gendered work with a small handful of community. It’s also because, though some small circles of consciousness-raising activists are happening, most gender is still compulsory and not letting up anytime soon. It’s because this binary compulsory gendered system hurts us. It’s because trans and gay kids are getting beat up and murdered. It’s because boys who wear dresses are shamed. It’s because tomboys who want to run around shirtless are shamed. It’s because women are not safe walking alone on the streets of Manhattan at night. It’s because I am not safe walking alone on the streets of Manhattan at night. And we should be able to be safe, I want us to be safe, all of us.

And plus? Underneath some of the hard work here, it’s really fun. It’s dress-up, it’s activism, it’s subversion, it’s sexy. It’s a deep celebration of you, of me, of our interaction with the world, and with each other.

Thanks, all, for the feedback and comments on that last post. Butch breasts and binding and female masculinity are all so deep in this topic, and as one reader mentioned, too, this is also an issue relating to females with large breasts in general. Sure, the gender stuff adds a slightly different dimension, but many women go through this and are challenged by having the right, comfortable bra.

A few more tips, and also some recommendation, since I’ve had a few emails about where to get these butch bras.

First: get the right size of bra. Sports bras obviously are a little less precise in their sizing, but even if you don’t intend to wear any regular bras anymore, figure out your size. It’s amazing how hard it is for us to figure that out. There really is a difference between a 34D and a 36C, and they are not the same size. This seems to be a particularly difficult one for many of the butches I know, because bra shopping is just about The Scariest Thing Possible, and going in there and asking a professional to help figure out what size you really are is pretty much like walking into hell. But, let me just say, it has made a really big difference in my bra-buying since I actually got measured properly, figured out why the sizes are different, and what size I really am.

Now, some product recommendations:

• Title Nine store has a variety of great sports bras divided by size and by “barbell,” telling you the no-bounce factor. The Frog Bra is particular famous for binding.

• Come As You Are has some great genderqueer products such as binders and packers (and my infamous Silky), and has two of the major compression vest brands, the Double (made in Thailand), and Underworks.

• I personally run into a slight problem with many of the sports bras or compression vests because I have some shoulder issues and if the straps are too much of a racer-back shape, it can cause further problems with my shoulder injuries. So for that reason, the best one I have found is a Champion Powersleek sports bra (I found mine at Macy’s - their site doesn’t seem to list it any more, but I think this is quite similar). Also, because it has a clasp, instead of being pulled over my head, I can actually buy a size that is slightly smaller and tighter, which I love.

Bras & binders are primarily held in place with material like elastic, and the stretch on those does give out pretty easily. I’m finding that I need a new one every few months (although, I suppose if I had more of them, I wouldn’t wear them out so quickly!).

Suggestions? Recommendations? What products do you all use? Any particularly good online resources for figuring out your bra size, or that explains why the sizes are different?

I’ve returned to earth - mostly - from the altered state of consciousness of the Power, Surrender, & Intimacy workshop by Body Electric that happened here in New York City over the weekend. I have so very much to say about it, but that’ll have to wait for now, I need more time.

What I do want to write about is breasts. Specifically, mine - more generally, butch breasts.

Last week, I went for one day without my binder, which is really just a tight sports bra that clasps in the back rather than being a solid over-the-head slip-on. I wanted it laundered for the workshop, since I’ve been wearing it practically every day since I bought it.

I wore a backup bra that day, and all day long I didn’t recognize myself in the mirror, in storefront reflections, in my button-down work clothes, or when I looked down. I remembered how I used to hate the uniboob problem, which many of my friends and lovers deemed unsexy or mannish, and it’s not that I like the uniboob look particularly, but as my gender has changed and grown and dropped into itself, the uniboob doesn’t look like a uniboob anymore: it looks like a chest.

It is not that I want to do away with my breasts. Don’t misunderstand me here: I think breasts are butch, just as I think the menstrual cycle is butch and pregnancy is butch and cunnilingus is butch - everything the female body does can be butch, because butch (in my use of the word*) has to do with masculinity on a female body.

And because I believe that the things a female body does are butch, and because my gender philosophies are deeply rooted in love and acceptance of my body as it is and in not classifying human experiences as owned by one gender or another, I have been holding back my desire to delve farther into my own masculinity. I’m afraid of it. I’m afraid it means I’ll be leaving my roots in female-ness behind, I’m afraid of being seen as reproducing the heteronormative paradigm or embodying penis envy. I’m afraid of being rejected by feminist and lesbian communities for being too masculine, for becoming the ‘enemy,’ for rejecting femininity instead of reclaiming it.

Breasts are a big piece of this fear for me. Mine are not so small - part of why I rarely pass: a 36DD, and have been since middle school. I’ve said since I was a teenager that a breast reduction is the only surgery I would consider. I read about Jess’s surgery - or others’ surgeries and body alterations - and I’m jealous.

But I’m afraid of what it means to want that alteration, to want to physically change my body to better fit a gendered idea.

After that day last week of wearing a regular bra, I started wondering: why do I even have this in my closet anymore? Why do I own this? My exploration of my own masculine/butch/boy/male embodiment is young - I’ve been calling myself butch since 2001, but only in the last three years have I really embraced it and actively, consciously developed it. And now, the farther I get into my explorations of gender, the farther I want to go.

It takes time to cycle through a wardrobe, and I don’t quite have the disposable income to go purchase all new bras - but I certainly won’t be buying any regular ones anytime soon. I’ve gone through this with my underwear already, years ago now, have cycled through all the old girl undies and haven’t owned any of those in years, only have boxers and briefs now. But that feels less obvious than binders and sports bras - no one can tell I wear only briefs except my lovers, I guess, but everyone can tell I bind my chest.

And see, what’s what it is now: my chest. Very different than boobs, breasts, tits. I have those, sure, but they’re underneath, they’re the other layer, the inner ring, something that now gets protected and covered, not out of shame or denial but simply out of layering, complexities, performance, a rich inner life, a duality, a whole person - me.

* Some say men can be butch, that “butch” is a term for a queer masculinity, or a non-traditional, progressive masculinity. I’m not certain I agree, but we definitely lack language to discuss different types of masculinity, and I have definitely observed some men who have a sense of butch energy.

… that Sinclair is single again, and dating. Spring is hovering just around the corner, and New York as a whole can feel it. The girls are already pulling out their swishy skirts, bouncy hair, strappy sandals. I notice. Man, do I notice. I try not to stare.

All that cliche shit is true about spring - fertility, rebirth, lust. The newness of those baby-green leaves are raw and luscious enough that sometimes I just want to bite them right off the tree. Destroy them with my mouth. Mmm.

At the last minute, I’m going to the Body Electric workshop that starts tomorrow (in fact, I need to leave in about four hours). I have some very particular intentions going into it, especially about the things that I’m holding on to. I want to let go. Leave it all be. Wipe the slate clean. (Et cetera, et cetera, ad infinitum.) I want to decline politely to the world’s human messes, to learn to say ‘no, thank you.’

My other intention is to bring the masculine butch boyishness again. It was a huge revelation for me last time, especially in a womyn-goddess-yoni kind of sacred sexuality space. But I learned so much. I need to take that with me again.

This is brief, I know; unfortunately, my schedule is only looking to be more packed in the near future. I will do my best to keep updating. Meanwhile, got any more butch eye candy to send me? I’m nearly out. C’mon, you/your girlfriend/your wife/your best friend/your lover/your favorite crush wants to be some Sugarbutch eye candy, I know you do.

Regular Sugarbutch writings will resume on Monday.

Thanks for all the comments & requests on the whispers, after poem - I’m glad to provide the audio of me reading the piece. Download it here: whispers, after mp3.

I’m most definitely not a recording engineer, and I get pretty impatient with the edits, so it’s messier than I’d like it to be. But I’m trying not to let my perfectionism about my spoken word get in the way. Thanks for the request, Viviane - happy to oblige.

I recorded audio for this piece, download the mp3 if you’d like to hear me read it.

“I really like the way you fuck me.”

“I’m not fishing, really, I don’t mean it like that - I’m genuinely curious - what do you like?”

…

It’s slow. Soft and slow, a slow steady build which means I am ready for more before you give it to me: a rarity, precious, because I open so rarely.

A desperation in my pelvis, my cunt, to be filled, to be broken down, to be taken apart into molecules and slowly put back together.

Then there’s that feeling of opening. Desperate, again, a desperate opening, something becoming wide and hungry.

And it’s all so slow and steady. So rock-steady, so solid. Makes my heart burst in my chest and I want to cry out, beg, ask for more, please, please, more, deeper, harder, faster, more, make me feel. I try to bite my tongue, here in this space, try not to let the desperation show. It seeps through the cracks of my eyelids and fingertips anyway. I know it is not hidden. I cannot quite access it with my voice, yet.

Instead, this is what my voice does: whimpers. Moaning with every exhale because my body is at such a vibration that the mere passage of air through my lungs and throat and vocal chords and mouth will exert sound. I cannot stay quiet. Oh oh oh at the very least and then there’s low hums of sound like ohhmmm and I remember what my yoga teacher used to say about the sound of the universe spinning and I feel my heart in orbit. I feel my atoms in orbit and I’m distilled down to the very sources of me, pooling on this bed, this floor, leaning against this wall, wherever, and you’re watching my eyes and I can feel the way you look through me, into me, and I think, this is what it feels like to be seen and it’s beautiful.

I like the way you surprise me with dominance, with force, with a sting or slap or bite. I love the rings of teeth marks on my biceps and inner thighs, the marks you’ve left, they’re fading now and I wish they wouldn’t, I wish they would always be there, wish for layers and layers of these bruises in different shades of yellow and blue and purple and the tender pink not yet deepened into black. I wish I could point to each one and remember the many days it took you to put them there. One a day for a week. For a month. A new way to tell time, a calendar on my arm.

It is not a threat to my masculinity that you wear a cock. That you fuck me with it. It has been, it could be, but you make me feel so boyish, despite your palmfulls of my breasts and twists of my nipples and the ways you say “oh I love the curves of your body,” and I know you mean the femininity, my hips, the way my ribcage gently tapers, my round full breasts I hide with binding and jog bras and button-downs.

Despite this - or maybe because of this, maybe precisely because you acknowledge my very female body, maybe precisely because you see me, really see me, really witness my soft underbelly, the vulnerable girl side of me that I have worked so hard to overturn, override, you see me and acknowledge me, too, actually speak about my body - despite this, you play with my masculinity with such respect and reverence, and it lives in such a solid place in me now, that it doesn’t hurt, it doesn’t contradict, it only affirms what I am already knowing in my body: the ways you witness, then acknowledge, then rejoice, in me.

As I’m sure you can see by the countdown clock in the sidebar, Miss DD is landing in New York City in 1 day, 9 hours, 22 minutes.

I’m, uh, getting nervous. Spent last night readying the apartment, washed the sheets, boiled the cocks (again), organized my closet, did laundry, swept the floors. In fact, the apartment is just about ready. Tonight, I have a long list of errands to run, ranging from 1. get my nose stud properly coiled so it stops falling out of my nose to 14. pick up snacks and breakfasty options at the grocery store.

After work, I’m meeting a friend of mine who I will now call “my stylist” for some outfit help.

Because, see, my boy wardrobe is getting kind of boring. I pretty much wear the same outfit when I’m getting dressed up for a date or for a reading of my work: black slacks, black or red button-down, tie. I guess this varies a little. I have a few sweaters that I occasionally wear on top. I like the peep of a tie through a v-neck.

But I need to spice it up a bit. That’s where my stylist comes in.

So we started talking about my “wardrobe,” and I started wondering about a “basic men’s wardrobe guide” or some such book on men’s style, because that’s what I do, right, when I have a question or a dilemma or a problem I go find a book. Well, perhaps first I google it, then I find a book.

I’m in the gathering-data phase of this wardrobe project, but I will certainly let you know what I uncover.

… this is all to say that Miss DD and I are plannng to go dancing on Sunday night, and I don’t have a thing to wear. I will dust off (and polish) the solid black wingtips, but I’d like to wear something fun, peppy. Suspenders? I can’t seem to find my fedora.

… and this is also all to say that I am avoiding the topic of writing about my nerves, and DD’s visit, because though I am 90% excited and thrilled and in awe and beside myself, I am still 10% terrified. I’m already braced for that inevitable heartache that will happen when I have to take her back to the airport, send her back to Seattle. The reality of loss looming behind all our joyous interactions is such a weight to carry between us. Will we weather it? What are we going to do? How will I fall for someone, date someone, explore someone, from such a distance? It can’t possibly be adequate. It can’t possibly be enough. How do I make it enough? How do we approach this, how can we possibly frame this so that it will work, function, like two real hearts intertwining?

She sent me a photo yesterday of a new paddle with “BOY” cut into it, ready to mark. I got out my ropes and flogger and practiced my ties and aim. Felt good to twirl my wrists. I tightened my bedframe.

And now my head is swimming with the practical questions. What do I wear to pick her up from the airport? Do I pack? Must make a car reservation. Must get the apartment prepared. Do I have eggs? What kind of coffee does she like? (She is from Seattle, after all.) See and then I’m back to the distractions of the practicalities, and I feel a little better.

Her cock slid in and out of my mouth.

It was not small. Mid-range, maybe; definitely bigger than the average dildo. Thicker and longer than many of my cocks, though not bigger than my largest. Long, too; a good eight inches at least. A light tan color very similar to her skin tone, and mine.

My hands clipped together in cuffs behind my back, I couldn’t grip it, couldn’t feel it in my fist and wanted to, but I also knew I’d be reaching for her, grabbing at her hips and sweet girl curves if let me free. I ached for her.

I sucked the head, tongued the shaft. I was out of practice, but not altogether bad.

“Look up at me,” she said, and took a photograph.

She kept her hands in my hair, on my shoulders, fingering my jawline. She felt the stubble I’d let grow, that I usually shave. I swallowed her cock, closed my eyes, hands straining against the leather cuffs. Took as much as I could down my throat. Watched her garter and thighs peeking from under the lace hem of her slip.

Sucked and swallowed and closed my lips over her cock as she held it, pressed into me.

“I think it’s time for you to be out of those clothes,” she said eventually, and pulled her cock from my mouth, let me up, and unhooked my wrists, but left the cuffs on. I pulled off my white button down, white tee shirt, boots, socks, jeans, briefs. “Leave the tie on,” she said. “And the cock.” I left my sports bra on too, and sat on the bed, kissing her again.

“You didn’t say I couldn’t play with these,” she said, sliding her hand against my breasts.

I was already breathless from her kisses. Sensitive, wound up tight. “That’s true, I didn’t.” She pinched my nipples, hard. I cried out, tried not to.

She kissed my cheeks, my neck. “I like this,” she said, kissing my chin where the stubble grew. “Oh, I like this a lot.” Fingers, tongue, lips - everywhere.

She attached ankle cuffs as I sat on the edge of the bed, slightly loose. Leather, soft and fur-lined. “Let’s have you on the bed,” she said. “On your back.”

I shivered, my skin tingling, and slid onto the bed.

“Put your hands on your cock,” she said. I did. “Grip it. Keep hold of it. I don’t want you to let go of your cock, do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“Yes?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Good boy.”

She hooked my ankles to the spreader she’d brought using clips, which gave me a little extra room to manouver. Really, if I tried, I could close my thighs, but my knees were still separated a bit. I liked the range it had. I couldn’t see it well, but I could feel it, and when she stepped away from the bed I pulled against it to see what I could and couldn’t do.

She slid on top of me, kissed me. Bit my shoulderblades, my sholders, my upper arms, then harder, harder, until I was writhing and she was biting hard, leaving marks, leaving deep bruises. The sharp pain jolted me into my body, jolted me right to the edges of my skin and I felt everything, felt every nerve in my body, felt my feet pulling against the leather. I make the kinds of noises that people make in sync with my breath, noise coming out whenever I breathe in or out. Gasping. I tried not to be too loud when I cried out.

It hurt. Oh, I liked it.

“You never told me you like pain this much,” she whispered in my ear, pinching my nipples. “You are the perfect combination of boy and girl,” she whispered as she palmed my breasts, bit my shoulder.

I felt exposed. “Really?”

She nodded, looked into my eyes. “Really.” And brought her cock to my mouth again. Straddled my chest and dipped it against my tongue. That position makes me nervous. I opened my mouth for it. Sucked. Lips swollen, red, tongue hot.

I tried to keep my hands on my cock. I wanted to reach for her, tear through her skin and silk lingerie. “I want to rip these stockings off you,” I said, cheek against her thigh when she withdrew from my mouth.

“Do you? Aww. Why don’t you kiss them,” she said, leaning to one side and offering me her thigh. “Only the part that’s covered. Not the skin,” she ordered. I kissed, brought my lips to the silky thin fabric, kissed and drew my tongue along the tight ring around her thigh where the stocking was held up by her garter. I could feel the tiny little ridges with my tongue and lips, the crosshaired pattern slightly rough against my mouth. I wanted my teeth tearing through it.

She moaned, and said, “enough.” She kissed me, worked her way down my body and paused for just a second too long at my cock with her mouth open just above it. My body shuddered and I ached, just ached to feel her lips close around it.

“Not this time,” she said, and slid off the bed, pushing the spreader bar up.

“Hold that there,” she said, and put it into my hands. I let go of my cock, bobbing from my pubic bone, and gripped the bar. My right leg was pulled up, knee bent, left leg higher, thigh pushed against my stomach by the bar, foot in the air, uneven.

“Stay here. Don’t move.” She moved around the room. I couldn’t see her, but she slid a condom on, grabbed my camera, and took another photograph. “You look gorgeous. So fucken hot,” she said, and touched my clit with something cold, so cold, I thought it was fingers full of lube but it just kept getting colder, and I didn’t connect it until she slid the glass dildo inside me, began working it in and out. My labia piercing conducted the temperature and hurt, ached, as though it was being pinched extremely hard.

I gasped, moaned, writhed on the bed, tried to keep my dick in my hand. Turned my head and yelled into the pillow. She shushed me, and repositioned to fuck me, loosened my g-string style harness so she could reach my cunt and slid inside slow.

“Don’t let go of that bar,” she threatened. I gripped it tight, felt my cock throbbing and pushing against my hand. “You feel that against your belly?” she said, low, next to my ear. “You feel your cock, all hard, between us?”

“Yes,” I breathed. I loved how she kept my cock in play, despite that I was not fucking her with it. Boyish. And god, she’s such a skilled top.

She fucked me like this for a while, legs spread and lifted, hips and ass curved up from the bed, my hands gripping the bar as she lowered herself onto me, cock thrusting. I saw red. Eyes rolling back. Gasping into her shoulder, sucking.

We kissed, kept our faces close. Smiled and giggled and gasped and rocked our bodies together. Eventually, she pulled away, slid back down my body, unhooked the spreader bar, and turned me over.

She smacked my ass, my shoulderblades, even the bottoms of my feet. Bit my shoulders again. I wished I could see her, watch her hips move. I was completely lost in the sensation. “I forgot I get your ass, too,” she mumbled at some point. Sure you did.

“Get up on your knees.”

She gave me her fingers first, then lubed up her cock and began fucking me from behind, entering slowly. My head was practically on the bed, holding myself up with my shoulders because my hands were between my legs, I couldn’t let go of my cock, which was fucken hard and thick and I felt it was going to pop in my hands. I kept it against my clit, kept my fingers circling the head, I love how that feels, the ridge of it against my thumb. Boyish. Masculine.

“You keeping hold of that cock of yours?”

“Yes,” I gasped into the pillow, pushing my hips back into her to get her to slide in deeper. She had her hands on my hips, pulled me back to her. I began whimpering, gasping louder into the pillows.

Fuck.

I don’t know how long we were like this. A long time. My sense of time in that hotel room was limited, having been told that I was not supposed to look at a clock and that she would be the timekeeper. She had full control of this situation, this scene, this interaction between us, and I gave in to her.

Excerpt from a letter I just wrote to one of my best friends in Seattle, after some conversations we had about butch & trans identities. I’m having a small (miniscule, tiny) gender crisis, and my week in Seattle opened up some very interesting ideas for me. I’ll be writing about it slowly here, as things get clearer.I’ve been turning that conversation about butches & trans guys over in my head, especially the question of, what’s the difference between us? I guess I find it easy to understand that there are very few differences between you & me, specifically, because of the ways we get along & get each other, but when it comes to the broader categories of butches vs trans guys, I feel like there must be something different about those identities. I’d never given it that much thought, but it seems like I had always assumed that trans had more to do with this disconnection from the female body - but I guess it’s moreso a disconnection from the “female experience”? Butches have that too, I suppose, but perhaps in a different way.

So what the heck is the difference, then?

I feel like steps 1-10 of “how I became butch” are match steps 1-10 for “how I became trans” when I’ve compared the identity development process between myself and my trans guy friends, but then that crutial step 11 for them is “and then I’m trans,” and mine is, “and then I’m butch.”

So what is the difference? Why the different conclusions to the same process?

Also, when you asked me if I’d ever considered transitioning … man, I’ve been tripping on that for a week now. Honestly, I’ve almost never considered it. I feel like it’s just something I “knew” about myself - “oh, transitioning, that’s cool, but that’s not me” - without really questioning it or thinking too deeply about it.

It’s only in the past year or so that I’ve considered my own genderqueerness to be a sort of trans identity, this masculinity on a female body, and the ways I’m claiming it anew have made it feel like a deliberate crossing of boundaries and gender lines, which I really like. Funny, ’cause I feel like I’ve been writing about this for a long time, but am still just now really figuring it out and owning it.

Four of my closest friends and very favorite people ever in Seattle - you included - are masculine-identified in some form, ranging from boi to butch to trans, which is interesting because I’m really surrounded by femmes in New York City. I gotta make some more butch/FTM friends here.

Point being, I went away from my visit to Seattle with my brain just spinning with identities and masculinity, and I’ve been in a bit of a mini-teeny gender crisis since.

That sounds dramatic.

What I’m thinking about is bodies, and how much the body you have affects the way you move through the world, access, privilege, how people respond and treat you, all of that. It’s amazing how much we know about the ways our bodies work now, we can basically have the body we want, if we want to be blonde & blue eyed, we can do it, if we want to be a size 0, we can do it - I mean it takes a hellofa lot of work (or surgery), but it’s possible.

And gender, of course, we can change the way we present entirely. Given how much happens on and to the body, I think we should consciously choose the body we want to have, and work toward it, in whatever way is best for us.

But then … what is the body that I want? I have in the past noticed how some of my (masculine-identitified, female bodied, though not necessarily self-identifying as) butch friends covet male bodies, the little “bubble boy butt” for example, and I just never noticed male bodies with any sort of interest really, I guess I’ve always been pretty female-focused. I remember thinking, when these friends have said those things, “huh, interesting, I’ve never noticed that, I’ve never thought of guy’s pecs or biceps or thighs or butt” and wondering what that meant, for my own gender. I guess now I think it means that I’ve just never given it that much thought.

but now that I’m actively thinking about it, I think I would like some more masculine characteristics to my body. Which freaks me out and totally excites me at the same time.

I know, I’m extremely late on this. I’m attempting to breathe some new life into the end of the Sugarbutch Star contest, so I can finally end it and hold a poll for the reader’s favorite!

This honorable mention submission comes from Bad Bad Girl … thank you. (Featured in Sugasm #102 in the top three!) 

The Straight Girl at the Dyke Bar

I was out back, in the alley behind the dive dyke bar, when she found me. Busted through the door with a fruity indulgent mixed drink in her hand and I feared for her balance.

“There you are,” she said. “I thought I saw you come this way.”

I was puzzled. “Are you okay?”

Her eyes flashed and she let the back door close on its hinge with a bang. “Yes,” she said. “Clearly.”

I took one last drag of my American Spirit and flicked the butt into the dumpster. “What are you doing?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” she slurred, just a little. “I’m trying to seduce you.” She was right next to me, my height, but she kept her eyes low and looked up at me with submission. My internal butch cock stirred.

“You’re drunk,” I said.

“Yeah.” She stepped closer and bit her lips, looking at mine.

“Are you here with friends? Maybe they should take you home.”

“I don’t think so. I’m not ready to go home.”

“You’re drunk,” I said again.

“Not so drunk that I don’t know what I want,” she snapped. “Only drunk enough that I can go after it.”

She inched closer to me. My mouth watered. I wanted my hands on the curves of her waist, her hips, her ribcage. I struggled to keep control. “What are you doing … here?” I almost said in a gay bar.

She sneered. “I know, I’m the only straight girl. I usually am. Well. Whatever.” Her tone changed. “I know how this sex thing works,” she purred, palm of her hand against my crotch where my cock was hard, straining against my zipper. The pressure of her fingers felt exquisite.

I knocked her hand away. “Hey.”

She withdrew and then slowly moved her fingers up my arm, felt the muscles, tendons. Circled her fingers around my wrist. “Come on,” she whispered. “I saw you watching me.”

Her neck was dangerously close to my mouth and I could smell her, sweet and thick. I wanted a mouthful of her perfume. Teeth on her skin. My hands moved - practically involuntarily - to the curves she laid out for me, the precise placement of her body next to mine inviting my touches.

She tilted her face toward mine. Half-closed her eyes. I didn’t even know her name. My friends were still inside, probably waiting for me. It was getting late. The alley was filthy. She smelled so delicious. The desire between us was pooling and tangible.

Her body was small, my hands with fingers spread covered her back. I brought them up under her hair, pulled her toward me, took hold of the back of her skull and neck. She leaned into me.

“Okay,” I said, watching her face as our lips barely brushed while I spoke. “But we’re going to do this my way.”

I brought my lips down on hers hard, crushing, devouring, insistent. She whimpered, back curving. I held her body at the precise angle and distance that I wanted, and she went limp in my arms, gave over, arms and shoulders falling back, on her toes.

Pulling away, I grinned. Took a step back. Kept my eyes on her, touched my lower lip with my thumb and felt that stirring in my stomach, that desire, that power. Her eyes got a little frightened and she attempted to keep her tough look, but it was a mask I would unpeel.

I closed the distance between us. Traced my fingers down her left arm until I reached her hand, still holding that delicate glass of fruity alcohol, and took it from her, tossed it hard, overhand, arm flexing, at the blank space where the building met the concrete in the alley. It shattered brilliantly, a cascade of glass, the sound filling the narrow space between the buildings.

She watched my arm, the glass, the crash. We turned our eyes back to each other, hers open, mouth open, small of her back arched. Her mouth watered and she moved her jaw, I could see it. Subtle. She wanted to lunge for me. Good girl, she stayed still.

Hardening my glance, I moved toward her, thick, keeping distance between us, and she stumbled back, her low heels catching on the uneven pavement, thrusting her hands out behind her but I kept her eyes, kept two fingers on her waist and led her back, back, until she was against the dumpster. She swallowed. It was wider at the top than the bottom, slanting out; she cowered under it a little.

I lifted my chin, once. “Hold that.”

She did. Lifted her arms to grip the edge of the dumpster. Made a face. “It feels gross.”

“Mmm.” You’re getting fucked in an alley behind a dive bar. What do you expect? I thrust my hand between her legs. She wore a tight skirt - I pulled at it, shoved it up her thighs to expose her. Pulled tight against the lacy fabric of her panties and pressed two fingers inside. Smooth. She inhaled, moaned.

“So wet,” I said, mouth against her cheek. She kept hold of the edge with her hands, arms raised. My body perpendicular to hers, cock against her hip. I worked my fingers inside, slick and slow and deep, thumb on her clit, on that spot below her clit, my hand gripping her pubic bone.

She moaned, knees weakening, hips dipping down to take in more of me. I added a third finger. “You know how to get fucked, don’t you.”

Mouth gaping, she breathed heavily, turning her head and biting her lower lip. I could feel my fingers working a good spot inside her and she was increasingly sensitive, reactive to my pressing and curling, thumb flicking a little lighter and faster on her clit. Her thighs shook and she lifted one leg off the ground, bent her knee, pressed her legs apart and against me, body shaking, pressed against me, until she gasped hard and I felt the ring of muscles grip my fingers, grip hard, her clit fat and sensitive and pressing against my thumb, throbbing, until she shuddered hard, bucked her hips, began to lose her balance and leaned against me, gasping, little moans coming from her throat.

She looked up at me, arms around my neck now. “I don’t usually come so fast,” she said, a little apologetically.

I shook my head, don’t worry about it. “I’m not done with you yet.” I didn’t wait, but took her wrists in my hands and put them back up onto the dumpster’s edge, then twisted her body so she faced away from me, pulled her skirt up over her ass, and unzipped my fly. Pulled my cock out. Sheathed it quickly with a condom from my back pocket.

With one hand I pushed aside her panties, slightly stretched now anyway; with the other I pressed her ass apart, then guided my cock into her wet hole. Stretched her lips as I pumped in and out, smooth slow long strokes, hips in circles, working the cock against my clit as much as inside her.

My release built easily in me after the way she came and it didn’t take long for me to grip her hips like handles and begin pounding, shifting my feet to stabilize my movement, muscles in my thighs hard and contracted, groaning and grunting with the physical effort of it all. She pressed hard with her hands against the disgusting dumpster, arching her back and pushed against me, receiving me as I fucked harder, hard, pulling almost all the way out and then slickly entering her again, the length of my cock, pressed tight against her ass and hips in rocking little thrusts, until I found that sweet spot and my clit contracts and I see myself exploding in her, which made me come harder, muscles thick and shuddering, gasping, slowing my pace against her until I came to stillness and peeled myself off her back.

She watched me over her shoulder, all eyes and hair, desire still in her face, painted over her cheeks, then rose and straightened her skirt, smoothed her hair. I tucked my cock back into my briefs and zipped my jeans.

She smiled at me, then started giggling, then laughing hard, full-bodied from her stomach, eyes sparkling. I was amused, and puzzled. “What’s so funny?”

“So,” she giggled, wrapping her arms around my neck and tossing her hair, “you’re awfully cute. Come here often? Can I buy you a drink?”

I laughed, pulled myself out of her embrace. “Sure. Why not.” I stepped up the three low rickety back stairs and opened the back door to the bar, let her step in first. Jukebox tunes and pool cues and women’s laughter spilled out.

I saw a few of my buddies at a table in the corner, they watched me come back in with my hand on the back of the girl. They made faces and gestures and raised their eyebrows. I shushed them with a look, turned my attention back to her.

“I, uh, I didn’t get your name,” I said.

“That’s cause I didn’t say,” she answered, hips switching as she dodged through the crowd and stepped up to the bar and immediately had the bartender’s attention. She ordered, glancing at me sideways: “Jameson rocks, for Sinclair.”