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# I learned to chew painkillers
- URL: https://www.fsm.ink/i-learned-to-chew-painkillers/
- Published: 2023-05-15T21:29:16.000Z
- Updated: 2026-06-03T18:38:27.000Z
- Author: Staff
- Tags: Poetry, #Import 2026-08-03 09:59

*by Billy Greene*

in the boy’s locker room  
before middle school  
gym class. Coach called it legwork,  
I called it labor:  
10-minute miles,  
burpees, cardio trials —  
easy for adults,  
fine for teenagers,  
impossible for a child. Illegal, too.  
I learned to live without water,  
without hunger, biting into  
pink acetaminophen pills  
like the candy Nana gave me  
for being “the best” today,  
“the best” everyday,  
“the best,” the -est alluding  
to being,  
truncating the participle,  
crystallizing the superlative.  
I learned to grow up then:  
It was long after the girls did,  
& given my long hair,  
I was offered a tampon once  
behind the bleachers  
by she who played both tennis  
& people, vulnerable, like me,  
pink dust coating our mouths  
because we both needed to get  
something down.  
I saw how Coach eyed her,  
eyed me, uniform & unisex  
in tight pairs of  
tiny elastic shorts  
too short for children. Not illegal.  
I’d like to think we made an alliance   
thereafter when I handed her  
an Advil in exchange,  
like Nana, like “the best,”  
providing one of the few things a queer kid could   
provide — pain relief,  
but really, neither of us  
knew better.