Ungrateful
- ️Mon Feb 03 2025
Ungrateful is a 2024 poetry zine by transmasculine poet and insurrectionary anarchist mk zariel. It is self-published on itch.io (https://mkzariel.itch.io/ungrateful)
and focuses on anti-assimilationism in the queer and trans community.
[Ungrateful] contains examples of:
- Bigot with a Crush: The narrator of "grateful" is homophobic, yet knowingly dating a nonbinary lesbian in an attempt to pressure them to stay closeted and to control them.
- Crapsack World: The world in "trans futures for maybe two people" is presented as such from an anarchist perspective. Anarchism is basically treated as an aesthetic for scenesters to engage in. Punk venues play host to Taylor Swift cover bands, there's a dating app for anarchists, Queers Bash Back has corporate sponsors, mutual aid distros are hosted in the suburbs — and actual anarchists are excluded.
- Destructive Romance: The narrator of "grateful" is presumably an abusive boyfriend, telling his partner not to come out as nonbinary or lesbian.
- Dystopia: The world in "trans futures for maybe two people" is presented as one for anarchists, in which anarchism is basically treated as an aesthetic for scenesters to engage in, but actual anarchists are excluded.
- Magical Computer: There is an entire poem entitled "other people's computers are gay" in which computers are somehow held up as queer liberationist icons.
- Middle School Is Miserable: The entire poem "middle school boys" is about the amount of patriarchy and harmful behavior in middle school, related by an ambigously trans narrator.
- Toilet Humour: In "middle school boys," the main critique of most middle school boys is that they're prone to fart jokes.