My sassy gay friend Is not an accessory When you go rooting through the closet and find him Lacing straight ties into chains Do not think that he will complete your outfit Just because a rainbow holds the hues that you were looking for Haven’t you seen that bruises also bloom in shades of purple and blue Fading into green and yellow With red far too often escaping veins that are supposed to hold it in Haven’t you seen what marks us And brings our identity to the surface of our skin When closet doors are slammed too often against our hands My sassy gay friend Is not a decoration You do not get to wear him at your hip To flaunt your acceptance And claim symbiosis As if he needs you to navigate the streets of heteronormativity Cutting short his words when communication is the best thing we have And when speaking fails us we resort to spending an afternoon Sending smoke signals into the sky Waiting for security in the focus that it takes just to Breathe My sassy gay friend Is not a collectible You do not get to gather us up into a complete set To line us neatly in an array Of rarities and charities And alternative identities Until you feel sufficiently well rounded In your attempted diversity My sassy gay friend Is not an icon A token character Or comic relief My sassy gay friend Is not meant to be romanticized Idolized Or fetishized He is human I am human You are human And if we see each other as sparkles and rhinestones We're all going to lose all the value That can't be found on price tags