It is unclear when exactly the carabiner became a symbol of lesbianism.

Most commonly, the practice is traced back to the Second World War, when women took over men’s jobs and adopted the appropriate gear, including carabiners.

Sometime in the 1970s, women who loved women started using carabiners to indicate whether they’re a top (carabiner on the left-hand side) or a bottom (carabiner on the right-hand side). A sapphic version of the hanky code, if you will.1

Cartoonist Alison Bechdel immortalised the first time she saw a butch in her graphic novel “Fun Home”. How did young Alison recognise the fellow lesbian she felt a strange sense of kinship with? The carabiner with her ring of keys on it.2

Carabiners are great. They’re versatile. They’re fashionable. They’re essential if you want to go rock climbing.

They’re also damn hard to open.

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Ground Control

I started working on what I came to refer to as my “Astronaut Act” for our Kokolores show in November last year.

My co-host Roger and I had chosen “Is This Just Fantasy?” as the theme of the show and I was struggling to settle on an idea.

Fantasy creatures was a possible direction (who doesn’t love a drag king dressing up as a vampire?), romantic delusions was another (who doesn’t love a drag king wildly flirting with the audience?), or maybe something involving magic (who doesn’t love a drag king wildly overestimating how quickly he can learn to do magic tricks?).

There were a whopping 47 tunes on my list of possible songs, some of which make a total sense (“Fairytale” by Alexander Rybak) and others that now seem absolutely mind-boggling to me (“Your Body is a Wonderland” by John Mayer)3.

While I listened to my playlist obsessively, the theme that stuck was space, with songs like “Space Oddity”, “Rocket Man” and “Starlight” as my front-runners.

It felt like a natural fit for the kind of glam rock masculinity I had originally buit my drag king persona Willie Eyelash on.

It also seemed like a perfect opportunity to do some soul searching via the medium of poetry.

Commencing Countdown

In my mid-twenties, I came out as bisexual.

The initial anxiety about telling my friends and family soon gave way to proper joy. But at the same time, I felt like I was desperately late to the party. Surely most people come out when they’re teenagers? It had taken me ages to figure out who I was.

But hey, at least I had done it now. I had braved the calamitous journey to the very core of my identity and lived to tell the tale. Check. Over and done with. Good work, everyone, that’s lunch.

Except, of course, I didn’t know half of it.

Coming out is not a one-and-done job. You have to do it - and choose to do it - over and over again with every new acquaintance. Identity shifts over time and in a way, that’s as wonderful as it is daunting. I hope I still learn new things about myself in ten, twenty, thirty years.

Here’s what I’ve learned in the last couple of years: I struggle to say anything definitive about my gender.

All I can offer is a random selection of moments: The internal sense of resistance I feel when someone calls me “Mrs”. The relief when there’s a gender-neutral toilet avaible at an event. How fascinating I found the first time I wore a binder. How it makes me smile when my wife refers to me as “her husband”.

At the same time, I don’t feel disconnected from femininity. “She” is not necessarily the wrong pronoun for me - it’s just one of a variety of possibilites rather than the only one. Sometimes I love dressing up in a very femme way - but only if I get to set my own beauty standards.

I think genderqueer might fit me best.

There’s a vagueness to it that I find comforting. An inability to pinned down. I like to be a little confusing. There’s joy in being inexplicable. Or at least there is to me.

Maybe that’s why I find it easier to speak about gender when I speak in poetry.

When I put together my “Astronaut Act”, I started thinking about space as a site of infinite possibility. A place void of expectations. Who would I be if no one was there to watch me?

This is how I ended up writing a spoken-word piece as part of my act. Here it is in full.

In Space No One Can Hear Your Questions About My Gender

When I tell them of my mission
The response comes in two parts
First there is a stunning silence
Then a hail of questions starts

Do I know what I am doing?
Do I know the time, the place?
Do I really want to venture
Into the empty void of space?

Along with questions come the warnings
Some are sharp and edged things
And the words and glances circle
Round my mind like Saturn’s rings

Don’t forget where you have come from.
Don’t be stupid, don’t go mad.
Space is cold and cruel and careless
When you’re back, you will be glad

I sit, I nod, I listen
I scribble warnings on my hand
I tape precautions to my helmet
I tell them all: I understand.

The day comes, my head is bursting
Commencing countdown, engines on
Fuel burns, ground disappearing
Before I know it, Earth is gone

And then I see what I’ve been missing
What I’ve forgotten on the ground
Why I went to make this journey
What the voices have drowned out

Space is not at all unfeeling
All the warnings were a sham
There’s finally enough vastness round me
To contain all that I am

I see the stars and then I feel it
I remember what I knew
I was searching for my kindred
I am made of stardust too

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Engines On

The rest of the act came together easily. I settled on Elton John’s “Rocket Man” for the beginning - classic, easily recognisable, excellent amount of drama. The poem would come after. To close it all off, “Abstract” by Hozier - a gem of a song that I know not many people would know, but my hope was they would be moved by the song’s melancholic grandiosity nonetheless.

My fabulous wife Clara graciously agreed to work on the audio file with me4. She cut the songs, helped me record the poem and even composed a cosmic, synthy instrumental to go alongside the words. She is a wizard and I love her so much.

The performance would be defined by gestures rather than movements. I’d come on stage as if I had just landed on a new planet, full astronaut gear, helmet and gloves. I’d take my helmet off, excited and terrified in equal measure. Then the poem, which I hoped would speak mostly for itself. As “Abstract” started to play, I’d take off my gloves, my boots and finally, my astronaut suit, to reveal a silver, glittering jumpsuit.

I am made of stardust, too. See how it shines.

The act premiered at Kokolores, on our home stage, and I loved performing it.

What a shame, I thought, that it wouldn’t work on most other stages.

Lift-off

It took half a year until I got to perform “Rocket Man / Abstract” again - but boy, did the act get an upgrade when I did.

One of my first ever drag gigs was at Düsseldorf Schauspielhaus. Effi Biest, their resident drag queen, has been hosting her show "Drag & Biest” there since 2022. She’s not only a marvellous hostess but also a great champion of all things drag in our region. She supports local artists tirelessly, whatever drag they do. When I first became aware of her show, she was one of the few who actively invited drag kings and drag things to apply.

My performance at “Drag & Biest” secured me at least eighty percent of my following gigs. Queens like Effi, who actively seek out what’s beyond their own drag and ferociously support what they find there, are an absolute treasure.

Effi invited me to be a part of her next big project at the Schauspielhaus, a two-hour journey through German drag history called “Drag & Biest XXL: Eine Reise durch die Zeit”.

My first show with Effi was at the Schauspielhaus’s smallest venue, which seats roughly seventy people. This show would be at the largest venue, with an audience almost ten times the size.

Effi asked me to do my astronaut act as the closing number of the show. In turn, I asked her for something that seemed almost too ludicrous to request: Could they somehow lower me from the ceiling at the start of my act?

As it turned out: Not a big problem at all. When I turned up for rehearsal a couple of weeks later, everything was already set up. Nico from the tech department walked me through the safety procedures, we came up with a signal for me to indicate if I ever felt unwell and he explained how I would get out of the safety harness once I had landed on stage.5

That’s how I found out: Carabiners are great. They’re versatile. They’re fashionable. They’re essential if you want to be lowered from the theatre ceiling for artistic purposes.

They can be also be damn hard to open.

Especially if you’re wearing full astronaut gear, including a helmet and gloves.

When we rehearsed the act in full, it took me ages to open the two safety mechanisms on each side.

The anxiety hit me instantly.

Maybe this had been a bad idea? I felt like I had asked for too much and couldn’t deliver on what I promised.

I went home feeling intimidated. The stage was too big for what I could offer artistically. So many people had worked on this show and I was letting them down.6

I had four days until the day of the show.

I weighed my options.

I couldn’t rehearse the act again until Friday. I could cancel the flying element of the act. I could adapt the costume, maybe lose the helmet. I could buy a carabiner and practice the movement of opening it.

Reader, I bought a carabiner.

Floating in the most peculiar way

It may seem like a silly thing to worry about but I knew my descent onto the stage had to look effortless. I couldn’t spend several minutes of the song fumbling with the safety mechanisms.

Over the next couple of days, I used my newly-bought carabiner like a fidget toy. Close the carabiner, close the safety mechanism, roll it back slightly so that it doesn’t get stuck, unlock the safety mechanism, unlock the carabiner, open the carabiner.

It may well be that this particular act of anxiety was unnecessary on my part. It may well be that I just needed one more rehearsal to get it right - or that I was just nervous during the first rehearsal.

But on the day of the show, everything worked beautifully.

As I was hanging below the ceiling, waiting for my entrance, all I felt was gratitude. To have such an amazing backstage team happily supporting a drag show of this caliber. To be asked by Effi to participate in such a special show. To have Clara, who was now sitting in the audience, supporting me during the shaky beginnings of the act.

It was time to stop worrying whether I deserved to be here and start to make room for the joy of being here at all.

The track started. I was being lowered from the ceiling. I could hear gasps coming from the audience. My feet touched the ground. I unlocked the left carabiner. I unlocked the right carabiner.

I had landed exactly where I was supposed to be.

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And the stars look very different today

One more thing was different for this second iteration of the “Astronaut Act”.

At the end of the song, once I had taken my astronaut gear off, Effi and my fellow performers Mary Lou and Remo Rivers came to join me on stage. As Remo said backstage, it felt a bit like I had landed on their queer planet and they were welcoming me, asking me to stay.

Together, we looked at the starry sky. I took their hands, tears in my eyes already.

See how it shines.

As much as I loved flying (and I did, so much), maybe this was the biggest upgrade for the act. A moment of community. A queer utopia among the stars.

See how it shines.

That same night, long after the show was done, I put my rings of keys on my carabiner. I now carry it everywhere.

See how it shines.

Thanks for reading this entire thing - I had a lot of thoughts and feelings and I appreciate you taking the time to engage with them.

Want to get in touch? Message me at askwillieeyelash@gmail.com anytime!

Thank you to everyone who took part in the creation of this act!

Audio, Photos and Love of My Life: Clara Clasen

Light, Sound and Fog at Brotfabrik Bonn: Flo Hoffmann, Eva Lewerenz

Fellow Aliens at Dhaus: Effi Biest, Mary Lou, Remo Rivers

A big thank you to the entire team at Düsseldorf Schauspielhaus, you were wonderful!

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A couple of years ago, a David Lynch interview became - of all things - a viral TikTok sound.

“Believe it or not, Eraserhead is my most spiritual film,” Lynch says.

“Elaborate on that,” the interviewer prompts.

The director responds immediately: “No. I will not.”1

Lynch didn’t like being interviewed. He believed that a work of art, once complete, shouldn’t need explaining.

“You’ve worked so that all the elements are working together and it feels complete and correct. Then you say it’s done. Then it goes out into the world but it doesn’t need any more explanation. It is what it is,” Lynch says. “For me, the words are limiting.”

I understand where Lynch is coming from. Art can be an expression of what we lack language for. The feelings we can’t quite describe.

At the same time, I’m not one of modern cinema’s greatest auteurs. I am but a humble drag king who loves nothing more than hearing about someone’s creative process.

I used to love watching films with the director’s commentary on2. My copy of the annotated lyrics of Stephen Sondheim is one of my most prized possessions. If I don’t listen to at least one podcast a day, I may perish.

So in this first Substack post, I’ll let you in on my creative process.

This is how we turned Florence + the Machine’s “Big God” into a drag king act - using tarot, poetry and the power of friendship.

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The Song

Every three months, I host a drag show with my fellow king Roger Moon. It’s called “Kokolores”. Roger and I assign a different theme to each show. This time around, we decided on “Unholy Masquerade”.

I love creating new acts for Kokolores.

I know our venue well, so I feel secure enough to experiment. To perform an act I wouldn’t do anywhere else. I aim for something that scares me just enough - but doesn’t paralyze me with fear.

The first step is always the same: I listen to a buttload of music. For this last Kokolores show, I ended up with a playlist of no less than nineteen possible songs3.

To whittle things down, I listen to my playlist over and over again. Crucially, I listen to it while I’m in motion. While I’m out running. While I’m cycling to work. While I’m cleaning the bathroom.

Usually, one song just kind of sticks in my mind. Evokes images in my head. Makes me curious.

“Big God” stuck in my mind alright.

The Drawing of the Cards

As soon as I landed on “Big God”, I knew I wanted more performers than just myself on stage. I knew I wanted dancing.

I also knew that I know fuck all about dancing.

So I messaged my friend Vanessa.

Vanessa Basilio de Luca (to give her your full name so you can look her up later and book her for all your choreography needs) has an understanding of dance that’s both completely instinctive and deeply knowledgable. She knows her dance history, her movement theory, her foundational texts - but nothing is more important to her than creating the kind of choreography that feels good to your body.

She gracioulsy agreed to work on the act with me. When we met up to discuss the concept, we did something I’d never done before.

We found the act structure with the help of tarot cards.

I had brought the cards on a whim. “Big God” made me think about rituals. The acts we perform to feel connected to a higher power. To invoke transformations.

We drew three cards.

Justice. (fairness, accountability)

Seven of Cups. (illusion, choices)

The Hanged Man. (sacrifice, letting go, surrender)

The Rehearsals

I cajoled two more friends into creating this act with me: my co-host Roger and fellow drag artist King Georgeous.

Both Roger and Georgeous are much better dancers with me. This much became clear when we met up for our first rehearsal, a couple of weeks before the show.

Based on the tarot cards, Vanessa and I came up with a motion that would become central to the act: A forward movement that gets stuck before it can be completed. The feeling of taking two steps forward and one step back. Repetitive. Robotic. Then things would gradually become unstuck. Freeflowing. Our movements would sync up and gain more ease.

Working with the three of them was like witnessing actual witchcraft.

We started with improvisational exercises. We showed each other the movements our bodies enjoyed the most. And magically, magnetically, those movements came together to form a choreography.

I tend to get into my own head when I’m creating an act, overthinking things before I ever get on my feet.

But improvising with the others, watching them work so instinctually?

It helped me to rely on my own intuition. It made me feel safe.

I had found my own little witch coven - and now we knew our ritual by heart.

The Poetry

There was one last thing I couldn’t get out of my head. Another instinct that wanted to be followed.

What if I wrote a poem to set the mood for the act?

I finished it shortly before the show, between the million other little tasks that demand your attention in the days prior to a big event.

“I’m going to read a little poem before my act, but I wrote it in a bit of a rush,” I told our awareness team apologetically, hours before the show.

With the kind of quiet determination that reminds you that you put together an excellent awareness team, one of the suggested a different wording: The poem wasn’t “written in a rush”. It was “born out of the moment”.

It made me realise that by creating this act, I had worked against all my worst instincts. I had been collaborative and stopped relying on myself so much. I had improvised where I usually stuck to strict routines. I had allowed myself to be spontaneous and vulnerable.

I had planned to perform a ritual all along - but as witchcraft would have it, I ultimately performed it on myself.

So I’m going to leave you with the final piece of the artistic puzzle. The poem I read before we performed our “Big God” ritual for the audience, in its entirety:

Prayer for when your heart is heavy and prayer seems impossible

Some mornings I wake up and wish that I could pray
That the folding of the hands over the heart
Didn’t feel like something made up
By the nuns at catholic school
To keep us quiet

I wish I could draw cards for you
To guide you far away from heaviness
That there was incense I could burn
That would turn your sorrows into smoke
Some incantation I could speak
And end with amen - let it be so

I cannot pray
Not for me
And not for you
I can only do
What heathens like me
Have done
Since prayer was invented:
I can hope

I hope that when all hope seems lost
There are people near you
Whose embrace fills you with warmth
In all the places where your bodies meet

I hope you find the strength
To put the phone away
When all knowledge is gathered
And all that’s left behind is anger

I hope you see a film that makes you weep
In a dark room full of strangers
And I hope that the way home feels like
A pilgrimage towards a life that is not new
But newly found

I hope you dance so wildly
That your mind becomes unstuck
And your body starts to feel like home again
And not like enemy land

I hope your boss’s emails never find you
Well or otherwise
I hope what finds you is a cup of coffee
And a slice of cake
You did not have to ask for

I hope there’s someone who speaks
The language of your soul
Even when you speak it low
And soft, just like a whisper
Someone that you miss so much
You send them pictures of your dinner and the weather
When their body is too far away

Some years ago
I etched some words into my skin
With needles and with ink
Another poet’s plea
That shall never leave my body
As long as it’s a body and not dust:

We must love one another or die4

And that’s as near to prayer
As I’ll ever be
And thus the words come to me sure and slow:
Let it be so.

Thank you for reading this entire thing! It felt daunting to write but also very rewarding, so I appreciate your time and your attention greatly.

Do you have any questions? (Thoughtfully given) feedback? Are you a fellow drag performer and want to chat about your own process? You can message me at askwillieeyelash@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you!

Thank you to everyone who took part in the creation of this act:

Choreography: Vanessa Basilio de Luca

Fellow Witches: Roger Moon, King Georgeous

Light, Sound + Fog: Flo Hoffmann, Eva Lewerenz

Photography and Love of My Life: Clara Clasen

Music, unknowingly: Florence + the Machine

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