Italo Ferrante (self-describe) is a gender-queer poet who earned a BA in English Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Warwick. To date, Italo's work has been selected for publication by Poetry Salzburg, bath magg, Cardiff Review, BODY, Lighthouse, Impossible Archetype, Ink Sweat and Tears, and Stone of Madness.

Easy read of the poems in the images above:

Queer Love Letter to Leatherface

CW: dysphoria, violence, gore

Leatherface waves his chainsaw like a trans flag.
its roar wakes me, an anti-woke dream,
surreal tableau shots of fingers restrained,
a killer in a pretty woman’s mask,
a killer who won’t hit back his father,
misread is his favourite feeling.

I manifest shoulder reduction,
a weekly estrogen shot away from splendiferous.
the sun is larger than the frame of my glasses.
dust grips my throat; crooked ribs answer.
hard consonants pulse in my throat;
soft vowels stick to boot soles.

Leatherface, if you’re close enough to meet,
drive me to the lake that burns with fire and sulfur.
clutter the farmhouse with the dregs of our dead selves:
footballer calves ripping tights,
clavicles puncturing padded blazers,
a fuzzy sweater for a bullet bra.

I’m the runt that’s going to die anyway.
I’m just a wild beast with tassels to you,
swallowing too many spiders at night
howling about my confusing nakedness,
until we become man, woman, both, neither—
monster, together.

It (Chapter Trans)

CW: dysphoria, violence, hints of rape

“I’m your worst dream come
true”
(Pennywise)

it’s just me & the torrential rain / the traffic lights glitch in
the storm drain / the love-boat tunnels turn to rubble &
rust / I paint my face a greasy moon / I’m a newly
hatched girl playing at life / I’m a were-boy nesting
in the yolk of the earth / lips red like a massacre
in broad daylight / head full of helium & asphyxiated
violet / can you hear the shrill echoes of dead names
/ can you feel the lure of lasered stillness / I manifest
a gas plumber to replace my leaking heart / I bleed
like a radiator in winter / rope-tied to a headboard / I milk
a clown who lied about his age / he crumples / he screams
that I don’t exist / crab claws in the air / he points to the centre
of my briefs / I’m too weak to give him lip tonight / instead I
lure him into an attic / full of mirrors that crack every second
/ I then squirrel my birth certificate away / I swallow my
adam’s apple / I skulk towards a hairless / beardless /
man-free future / in the dank darkness / I see all of my-
self & none of it / in the dark dankness / I become it