The Stemmler/Dennis LGBT& Award, established by Sigma Tau Delta members Dr. Kevin Stemmler and Dr. Larry Dennis, honors exceptional creative and critical works that represent or celebrate the LGBTQ+ community. This annual award addresses the historical marginalization of LGBTQ+ voices in academia, providing recognition for both creative and scholarly contributions. The award’s name incorporates an ampersand, inspired by GLAAD’s “&Together” campaign and the work of G&LR, symbolizing inclusivity and unity among diverse identities. This year’s winners were selected from over 120 eligible submissions for presentation at the annual Sigma Tau Delta/English Honor Society Convention. Submissions were evaluated by LGBTQ+ faculty judges in the Society. For more information, see English.org, “Awards”
As part of Lambda Literary’s partnership with Sigma Tau Delta, we are proud to celebrate the achievements of Stemmler/Dennis Award winners like Elijah Russell.
Author’s Note: I’m Not Your Golden Boy is a collection of poems that is a resistance of existence, and yet I find myself often loathing that idea. What I do every day, my joys, my sorrows, are not in resistance. They are in survival, in hope, and sometimes in spite. I may exist to spite those who wish for otherwise, but I exist for myself first. People love talking about the politics of being transgender. But I am a person, not politics, and I think too often people forget that. I am a person who can be happy, angry, and disappointed. I am not just trans, I am kind, anxious, aloof, creative, and self-conscious. This collection is a mix of feelings just as much as I am. It is just as much about being trans as it is about just being myself—more than a representative, and more than a statistic.
Osteological Error
I want to wash my bones
To remove the alluvium
Of discomfort and pain
Deposited by my blood.
I want to scrape away layers like plaque off teeth
Grind away joints under manos
Making them new again
Right, again.
I want to reform incorrect guesses of archeologists
Who glued together my worn through body.
I need to wash my bones
With their delicate brushes and rough chisels
I need to put myself back together
In some new form.
Bury me in the backdirt
Let me rest under kilograms of comfort.
I need to be in situ
Free of the underlying feeling of
Misplaced joints and
Caked on filth
So maybe the blood flowing through my body
Won’t feel so wrong.
Take You Up with Me
When they find your bones y’know—
You cough through a cigarette
—They’ll say you were a woman.
I say no
I’ve taken my precautions
Have you?
I will burn my body And my bones.
My ashes will be indistinguishable from the dirt.
The dirt that will surround your puffy rotting corpse.
They won’t know who I was. What
I was. But they’ll know you.
They’ll know what you were.
My ghost will carve the words into your still porous skeleton.
Bastard, cunt, fucker.
I may have been a freak,
But you were hateful.
And really, what’s
worse? And I may be a
demon But demons have
wings
And I will dig my hands into you
And drag you up to hell with me.
Invisible
Poem created with text from The Charlie Kirk Show, April 1st, 2024
Dead Starfire
Joy like fire, joy muddled by desire
Greed and need are close cousins
Hard and harder to deny this incessant choir
Wishes well or poor still send stars higher
Only burning brighter against the night
Joy like fire, joy muddled by desire
These whispers only get more dire
Claiming hate, spite, betrayal unabashed
Hard and harder to deny this incessant
choir
Celebrations so easily misfire
A snap, a bend, a word, a sudden jolt
Joy like fire, joy muddled by desire
Insecurities so easy to acquire
Stitches and thread turned to knots
Hard and harder to deny this incessant choir
Let the dead starfire take over my entire
Greed and need, such close cousins
Joy like fire, joy muddled by desire
Hard and harder to deny this incessant choir
ELIJAH RUSSELL is studying for a BFA in Creative Writing at Chatham University, located in his home city of Pittsburgh, PA. He primarily writes fiction, with some poetry in between. Elijah is passionate about environmentalism and LGBTQIA+ rights. In his free time, Elijah dabbles in his many, many crafting hobbies, collects too many typewriters, and watches YouTube.
