Cynthia Cruz’s “Strange Gospels” is a title appears several times in her series The Glimmering Room published by Four Way Books. The particular poem I am speaking of is located precisely on page sixty (the eleventh “Strange Gospels” on the table of content). This one particularly caught my attention, because of her references to the character Billy. Billy gives breathing life to the series, because of the depth depicted in the character through his or her life experiences. It plays with the ideals of gender, and how it is depicted in society. It also criticizes society’s constructs of gender, and how it does not necessarily pertain to one’s biological sex.

Strange Gospels

                                Billy is dead.

                                They found her

                                In a car in the lot behind the Mab.

 

                                Chinatown street corners

                                At thirteen in Redd Kross

                                Tank top and silver-glitter platforms.

 

                                Billy’s dead.

                                But I carry her

                                Black fur

                                Bear in my arms-

 

Cruz, Cynthia. The Glimmering Room. New York, NY: Four Way, 2012. Print.