To Another Girl Called, “Other”:

they can’t figure out 
how to make fun of you, 
so they fall in love. You 

are a scatterplot-- no primary 
color, no neat column of statistics, 
this combination leaves you 

alien and otherworldly like 
the gods, face of all humanity 
because they all see themselves 
reflected in you, but not enough 

to feel like you’re one of them.

Alison Lubar teaches high school English by day and yoga by night. They are a queer femme of color whose life work (aside from wordsmithing) has evolved into bringing mindfulness practices, and sometimes even poetry, to young people. Although they currently live outside of Philadelphia, they dream of returning one day, with their pack, back Westward. "To another girl, called 'other':" was first published by antonym lit, December 2020. You can read more of their published work at http://alisonlubar.com/.