You're not like the other girls I've loved
Your laugh is like the embodiment of summer
Warm weather and flowers blooming
Two girls with sun kissed skin and strawberry lips, that's us
Please don't ever go away my love
I don't think I could stand it if you did

I don't write a lot of poetry about me being queer.
Not because I don't like it.
I love that about me.
It's because I'm lucky.
I'm so  lucky that I grew up with parents who hugged me when I came out.
So lucky, that my friends reacted with a "hey, cool".
So lucky that all of this let me come to terms with myself.
I never hated myself because of who I am...I'm so so fucking lucky.
But there's so many out there who didn't have this.
Who's parents kicked them out or beat them.
Who's friends left them alone.
Who hate themselves for who they are, for the wonderful things that they are...
For me it was easy, for you it might not be
For them it can be so hard.

Okay kid here's the deal, you'll come into this world and everyone will tell you how to feel.

Fast forward, fifth grade, you're in the bathroom stall. The first time you knew the word gay, it was written as a slur on a dirty cement wall.

When your brother came out it shouldn't been a surprise, but even
you became accustomed to the fear behind his eyes.

Using art as an outlet, you set your electricity free, bleeding words onto paper, grasping for being who you wanted to be.

Drunk on idealism and Tumblr walls, discovering yourself, refusing to fall.

Into the same routine and monotony like the rest, you took your pain to the stage, ripped your heart open and confessed.

Screaming I AM WHO I AM, with your arms open wide, who knew one day you'd finally refuse to hide?

I am
Mostly dependent
On independent people
Especially when they’re women—
Especially when they’re you.

You, with your
High-pitched laugh and your
Dark hair up and your
Pride loud but your
Voice louder and
Heart
Closed.

Yes,
I am dependent
And most days I repent it
To have my body and
Soul and
Heart and
Head in
You.

And you
have your head and—
Your head.
And that’s, you say,
What you like in me.
Yes,
That’s the takeaway:
My academic
Skills
Not the late nights spent
Holding you or the
Times I went
To comfort you
Or the energy used
To convince you
it’s true:
You are
Enough.

Enough, I said
On the floor
I told myself
I couldn’t do this
Anymore,
I—

Am a person
Not a therapist
Per se
A laborer
Always
A construction worker
for you
And me
And us but
Even I can’t fix a
One-way street,
Not me.

Although sometimes I’d like to—
Especially when you look at me the way you do and
Lift my skirt and break the rules
And scream louder than
Anyone else,
You.

Narcissist,
You ghost-like figure
Presence-less, you sometimes-mess
And yet I insist to
Chase you
but you’re the one who will haunt me
through and through,
You and your fucked-up ways
To show
Love
After all,
There is not space for me
in ‘I.’

But then I remember
The way you defy
Expectations—including mine
and every time
You deny
that you are afraid
For your life
But let me tell you
So am I
Afraid for my heart when we’re apart
But lately also
When we are together.

See, I knew this wasn’t forever
But I thought the end was yet to come,
Not yesterday.
Or I guess maybe it was
Right at the start—
The first time you kissed me
And the first time I missed you
When you didn’t miss me,
You.

And now you have me here
In this space
This in-between,
And I,
A basket case—
Wishing that
I wasn’t here
That
I wasn’t queer
That maybe if I found a man
I could spare myself this
Late-night pain and
Post-drink drain
So
I will find a husband and
A house to stay in with
a white-picket fence and
Pretend
that I am numb so that
I won’t feel happiness
but I won’t feel loss
And
I won’t feel like this
Ever again.

So here I am and
Although it’s different this time around
I am still bound
by my roots
And my wounds and my soul.
This may make me dependent but at least
When I said I loved you I meant it—
Yes, I am in love with you,
But
From the start, everyone knew
And they told me to
run
Away
And run I did
Right toward you
You, my gone-too-soon,
Almost-truce
Hope-in-doom,
Nightmare,
You,
And I am
A fool.

well there goes another parade,
we're now marching with rainbows on our bodies and hashtags on our face
our roars pierce the skyline as the guns fire
bang! bang!
another bullet
in our direction
another life lost
and now we have a new sensation
young man murdered for a skin colour he didn't choose
young man murdered because 'he seemed like he was from the hood'
young man shot dead for following the rules

hashtags flooding twitter, photo sets on tumblr, double taps on instagram and likes on facebook
debates firing up and questioning the truth
we're marching
with the names of the dead carved on our skin
girls murdered for loving girls and boys murdered for loving boys,
a girl being murdered because she no longer wanted to be a boy.

we're crying,we're laughing,we're screaming and we're dying
and now the walls are covered in our writing
because we will never stop fighting

fall softly, my love, for i have missed
the sweet caress of rain against my calloused skin
free from careless storms, i have found in you a love that demands to persist
an enormity so grand that is our wonderful sin  
of which we once tucked behind dreaming eyes
now, at long last, had bloomed into reality
and as we stumble further into love we shall publicize
an act as pure and vulnerable as you loving me
for angel, you shine too bright for i to feel ashamed
over cowardly concerns of loving openly
and through everything we have both proclaimed
that despite the odds, the best way to love is outspokenly
we carry the weight of our past regret
and yet, we dare to love, my juliet