Good Crips Go To Heaven But Get Stuck at the Stairway

GOOD CRIPS GO TO HEAVEN BUT GET STUCK AT THE STAIRWAY
after Quin Eli

Robin M Eames

[image: Robin, a white genderqueer wheelchair user, in a graffiti-covered Redfern alleyway looking up at the title text. They are wearing fishnets and glitter, and there are rainbow covers on their wheelchair frame. Above this is a photo of red-lit fairy lights.]

Be bad, love. Take that bad attitude
and forge it into armour. Turn chains
into chainmail. Take the rage and rancour
and make it plated bronze, brace your joints
in bitterness.

[image: colourful graffiti on a wall including the text ‘transphobes with no teeth’; a close-up photo of a brass microscope]

Blaze apotropaic iron
out of acrimony, glare back at staring eyes.
Rebel and revolt.

[image: a hand passing through flame; an x-ray of Robin’s cervical spine in flexion and extension, where their lip piercing is visible]

Forget that carceral logic,
be grassroots, be light and fire.

[image: close-up of poppies; film photo of orange and yellow nemesia flowers]

Let your disabled body
be fierce and furious, let your disabled mind
be ardent and wild.

[image: Robin wearing a colourful dress doing a wheelie in front of a graffiti-covered wall; a long exposure shot of a rainbow hoop, with colourful streams of light flaring out around a vague figure]

Wrap steel around your heart
and let your heart stay soft. The life you have
is a life worth living.

[image: vibrantly coloured cardiac echoes of Robin’s wonky heart (no idea what specific valves are pictured!!); eucalypts at dusk]

Be proud, love.
Be loud and unashamed. Fold fear into a shield,
let all of it reflect away.

[image: colourful sunlit photo of pink and orange bougainvillea flowers; a photo of a seagull flying low above the water, reflection visible on the water’s surface]

Don’t look back,
don’t dwell in regret. Let yourself seek redemption
without the tragic backstory, without justification
or explanation,

[image: Robin lying on a velvet green sofa, reflected in a mirror; sunlight falling over tiny daisies]

without “what’s wrong with you”
or “what happened”. Let it happen.
Bite the hand. Demand, don’t ask.
If they care, they’ll fight beside you.

[image: water droplets on a window with greenish bokeh in the background; light leak bleeding over a film photo of gauze curtains]

Piss on pity
and inspiration, reject involuntary martyrdom.
Be that transgender menace, that lavender threat.

[image: sunset behind morning glory flowers; morning glories against a lavender sky]

Be damned, love. You’re there already.
The world is burning. Take hell
and make it yours, be hell on wheels.

[image: huge fireball; long exposure of a rainbow hoop moving sideways, creating a geometric pattern reminiscent of spoked wheels]

Be monstrous, be the bad example,
the bad influence, the bad cripple.
Be noncompliant. Speak in your own language.

[image: film photos of glowing jellyfish]

Live fast, live strong. Fight for liberation
not assimilation.

[image: clouds lit up at sunset; film photo of common pink daisies]

Remember solidarity,

stay strange, keep weird and queer,

and always channel anger into action.

[image: double rainbow through water vapour over trees and apartment buildings; close-up of sunflowers]

You are loved and not alone. There is more than this

and more to come. Be joyous, my love, be bad.

[image: jacaranda tree in the golden hour; gum trees and streetlights at dusk]