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“To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves.”
― Federico GarcÃa Lorca, Blood Wedding and Yerma
The Lost Pardner
We loved each other in the way men do
And never spoke about it, Al and me,
But we both knowed, and knowin' it so true
Was more than any woman's kiss could be...
...The range is empty and the trails are blind,
And I don't seem but half myself today.
I wait to hear him ridin' up behind
And feel his knee rub mine the good old way.
-from 'Sun and Saddle Leather,' by Badger Clark
Intersection
When I help a woman on with her jacket,
my sexuality grabs my gender identity
and waltzes it around the room.
I’m a woman, but there’s a man in me.
He’s a bit of a fop, sort of a pansy.
He might be a fag.
Why shouldn’t everything about me be fluid?
I’m a squishy skin-bag of water and salt,
ocean inside and out.
As a child, I was sure I was a boy.
The heroes of all the best books were boys.
I pretty much lived in my head, what I read.
Now I feel more like a woman –
except around straight women.
Then I feel like a butch lunk.
My husband thinks I’m a femme
because I wear lavender, (color and scent),
and ask him to open jars.
All roads meet in me:
butch when I wake up,
femme at lunch.
Androgynous at dinner,
totally trans all night .
Can I get that door for you?
Jan Steckel, 2010
6 T H D A T E
We sat on his couch, facing each other,
backs against armrests,
feet intertwined.
He told me he wanted to teach me Spanish pronunciations,
asked me to repeat after him.
I attempted to mimic his words like a parrot to its owner,
struggled with the rolling “R’s”.
The foreign words spilled clumsily from my mouth.
He suggested he name off animals
and I was to guess which one.
He changed the lesson plan.
My feathers ruffled as I assumed
it was because I wasn’t good.
He gave words for
cows,
penguins,
dogs, and
doves.
I was surprisingly good at assessing
and assuming translations.
But those weren’t the words
I wanted to know from him.
I wanted to ask about
trust,
attraction,
the meaning of our feet touching,
and most of all, I wanted
to know our future.
I swear to the Lord
I still can't see
Why Democracy means
Everybody but me.
- Langston Hughes*
Langston Hughes
I saw you last night in the gathering,
but could not take you openly in my arms,
so I put my lips next to your cheek,
pretending to talk privately.
-Rumi
"Too late!" murmured Julian; but the cry was hardly heard in the intensity of the moment.
The scent of mimosa was everywhere. Mimosa!
In after years Julian never allowed any one to bring that scent into his house. But upstairs a little shrine was always decorated with mimosa blossom.
Too late! He had gone down the dangerous path and had crossed - crossed to the other side.
Too late!
The bark of a desert dog brought him for a moment to his senses, but only for a moment.
The warm body at his side, the fire in his heart, set his pulses tingling. The blood coursed like fire through his veins.
With a cry of resignation to fate, with a cry of joy or rather of sorrow ended, he drew Tayeb to him; and, as there is a God in heaven, those two souls became united in that one sacred moment.
And all about them, all around them, hung the stillness of the desert.
Chapter 8
He said "My name is Love."
Then straight the first did turn himself to me
And cried, "He lieth, for his name is Shame,
But I am Love, and I was wont to be
Alone in this fair garden, till he came
Unasked by night; I am true Love, I fill
The hearts of boy and girl with mutual flame."
Then, sighing, said the other, "Have they will,
I am the Love that dare not speak its name."
-Lord Alfred Douglas
The line that separated Arab from European, master from servant, had been rudely snapped. Julian and Tayeb became as one.*
"I have felt the greatest hate that this world has ever known.
I have hated myself for what I am.
All I heard about what I was was that I was sick, wrong.
But then I met him.
I met one of the most beautiful people on this Earth.
He’s funny, he’s smart, and he is everything I want.
I know now, that I was sick.
I was sick for ever thinking that what I felt was wrong.
Because it’s Love. Pure, simple, fiery love.
I hear what people say about what I am.
I hear the bigotry in their voice, and I hear the fear.
I hear about how I’m going to burn.
I am going to burn.
I’m going to burn in the fire of God’s love for me.
And his love for me.
I fear for those whose who hate.
Because hate is a frozen thing, and only makes one unlovable.
I fear for my family, who hates me.
I love what I am, I love my soulmate, and I love God.
I love, not lust, for the fire that I am doomed to.
Because I am gay."
There are those who say
an array of horsemen,
and others of marching men,
and others of ships, is
the most beautiful thing on the dark earth.
But I say it is whatever one loves.
It is very easy
to show this to all:
for Helen,
by far the most beautiful of mortals,
left her husband
and sailed to Troy
giving no thought at all
to her child nor dear parents
but was led...
[by her love alone.]
Now, far away, Anactoria
comes to my mind.
For I would rather watch her
moving in her lovely way,
and see her face, flashing radiant,
then all the force of Lydian chariots
and their infantry in full display of arms.
(LP 16; Groden 7)
"Valuing personal love above heroic glory separates Sappho not only from the epic tradition but from her only important lyric predecessor, Archilochus. The first woman poet is the first poet to give love this central place. Though she takes the figure of Helen from the epic tradition, she refuses to castigate her as the woman who betrayed her husband. Rather, she honors her as a woman strong enough to be led by love, by her own feeling."
"Same
Sex
Marriage."
"Sex - Sex - Sex"
That's all people hear.
"Same Gender Marriage" lets them hear
"Commitment. Kids. Broken Dishwashers. And our Love, too."
Fib structure for syllables per line:
1/1/2/3/5/8
Haiku structure for syllables per line:
5/7/5
100%
My grandfather pulls me aside,
shows me his cardigan,
baits me for a compliment.
I’m hooked.
I comply.
He tells me it is wool,
opens the right side, shows me the tag
100% virgin wool.
He brings out his charming smile,
“You know how hard it is to find a virgin these days.”
I laugh at his joke
and keep laughing as a reward to him
because I like that he has shared this with me.
I enjoy the role of grandson,
he is the only man who can take me there.
I fear my other relationships with men could end what we have together.
A man
whose 78-year-old body carries him through his weekly routine;
3 games of golf, 2 games of bocce ball,
and dancing on the ballroom floor.
His comment only to me,
his humor was not lost on his 20-year-old gay grandson.
He must know.
I’ve never said it;
I’ve never not said it.
The joke – universal.
Is that why he told it?
He had told me of times in the army,
his valued possession a photo of the green-eyed blond beauty with thin lips.
Who would become
his wife,
the mother of his children,
my grandmother.
He had told me of when he was 13 and understood why women were to be respected.
He saw a mare giving birth.
Stood there for hours
as blood, embryonic fluid, and water
poured out of her.
Finally a foal
and my grandfather was never the same.
“Stevearino, after that I never talked back to my mom, I always held the door for the ladies, I vowed to be a good husband. You see I realized that women create miracles.”
His life has been centered around women,
this is something we do not have in common.
We laughed over virgins
but thought of different ones.
My grandfather,
a man
who pats my head,
rubs my back,
kisses my cheek,
tells me he loves me,
and hopefully
isn’t ashamed that other men do the same.
"Some of the most powerful poems are mined from personal experience."and I think he's proved that with "100%"
Wednesday, April 15, 2009 from 6-8 p.m.It's sure to be amazing!
West Hollywood Library
[in West Hollywood Park]
715 N. San Vicente Blvd.
West Hollywood, CA 90069
Please call (310) 652-5340 for further information
'My true love hath my heart, and I have his..."
My true love hath my heart, and I have his,
By just exchange one for the other given.
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss:
There never was a better bargain driven.
His heart in me keeps me and him in one;
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides;
He loves my heart, for once it was his own;
I cherish his, because in me it bides.
His heart his wound received from my sight;
My heart was wounded with his wounded heart;
For as from me on him his hurt did light,
So still, methought, in me his hurt did smart;
Both equal hurt, in this change sought our bliss:
My true love hath my heart, and I have his.
