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Anam 4d
Oh dear lover of mine
you're like a bottle of
my favorite wine

One sip is never enough
to know what you're like
Sip after sip, I realize
somehow, we're oh so alike

Few more sips and I'm
drunk on you
I'm dizzy but I take
yet another sip or two

You're hard to put down
I chug all of you
Could teach your shadow
a thing or two
for I now know
all of you

I love you
The sun never rises here, the moon never falls,
despite the nightly intrusion of thoughts
that never seem to expire into the current.

Two birds screech above but I do not listen:
“Our religion is one of love,” they tell me
while they slam the door in my face
to go and vote for a straight man elated
to erase the love I have for nobody but me.

“Church is the only path to Salvation,” he tells me
after a night spent in my hometown bed;
hypocrisy is the root embedded throughout the forest
of Fatherly Love, created only to benefit those
normal enough to write the rules
before anyone else could…
                                                  How convenient.
Our Father makes no mistake
and carefully creates us all,
yet my love is seen as a ******* painted onto
a blank canvas thrown across a rusted floor.

“A genetic error,” say the men who later imagine
the ache of my nails digging deep into
their rugged, tightened backs;
the wedding ring on their finger
refracts the light of the bathroom mirror
as cans of crushed beer pile high
in the trash strewn
on the ground behind them...
                                                  So many frauds.
I live my days on the edge of whitewashed insanity,
yet forever closing my eyes to darkness
is a life I wish not live:
the mothers who birthed us to fade into the grave,
the love they lent evaporating upon expiration,
our fathers who protected us far removed,
their eyes forever closed, their life no more.
I cannot fade into nothing, this I won’t believe…
                                                                                      So hopeless.
The God I love does not punish
those defying the rules He’d always known
would one day be certainly shattered;
He does not make me love men
and sentence me to die in the same command
despite the thousands of hymns I whispered
in the solace of my childhood room.

He does not send men to sleep at night
and force them to question what they feel—
tossing the sour taste into the background,
ignoring the truth of the real me…  
                                                             How cruel.
The God I know made me the way I am
and is proud of me for taking it in stride.

He does not wish to see me change --  
He frowns at the men desiring revenge
on us who wish to be left alone --  
we do not need your opinion,
we do not need your love,
we do not need your thoughts or your prayers,
for the God I love welcomes me with open arms
unlike the multitude of others I no longer remember…
                                                                                          So unimportant.
My mother cannot find her camera,
and I wondered if I'd left it with you.

My stomach churns like the deck of a ship
amid a raging mid-Atlantic tempest,
its bowels tender and full of friction,
a morose resentment of an azure message sent.

The Dungan name supports its own;
the pain of one is felt by the majority,
an empathetic woe of a blessing understated,
our emotional reason ranging far and true.

One text sent and the world turns dim;
I've tried to manage the mania and valleys
of the experiences endemic to our core,
but the truth remains that I've not healed at all.

I can envision the late New York nights,
our Hoboken studio glimmering in the sunset,
the white walls imprinted with our fingertips;
open bottles of wine half-drank scattered around
while the subway roars underneath the Hudson
as it zips to a jolting halt.

Meanwhile, the scars embedding my skin
have healed themselves through and clear,
yet the bruises around the perimeter remain,
their coarse outlines distant reminders
of the pitfalls of the love we once shared.

Fire and ice juxtapose into a glass of lager,
a cool glide down the warm embrace of my throat;
nightly cocktails of Lexapro, Lamictal, and Hydroxyzine
haven't succeeded in easing the terrors
plaguing my core in the brightest of nights --
it is surmisable that these wounds are lethal,
but I refuse to succumb once more to your flaws.

My mother cannot find her camera,
and I wondered if I'd left it with you.

Whether it lay with your father and his bourbon
or your mother and her manipulating lies
or your brother and his ignorant resolutions
or your friends and their misogynistic gazes,
I cannot say,
yet I felt compelled to outstretch my fingertips
as a solemn branch of the willow tree
waving in the wind, scattering in the breeze,
an innocent attempt to brush aside the despondency,
a sprout into maturity to digress from the winds
raging between us while residing so far apart.

Never truly have I possessed a hatred so seething
than the alps of brimstone in the frame of you.

My mother cannot find her camera,
and I wondered if I'd left it with you.

Perhaps I should have remained in oblivion,
restrained myself from the shackles of your presence.
Still, I refuse to conform to the demands of those
unaware of the true nature of my nightmares,
their benevolent intentions disregarding my truth,
white wisps of flowers stained with brutal crimson,
inching its way down the crevices of my mouth
while I reel away and encapsulate the open flesh
I'd just bitten through with this impulsive decision.  

But still...
my mother could not find her camera,
and I'd only wondered
if I'd left it with you.
Caosín Dec 2023
I don't want to be different anymore. I want to be the same. I want to be the same. I want to be the same. I want to be the same. I just want to be the same. I don't want to be different anymore. Can't you make me the same? Why did you make me different why can't you make me the same?
Francie Lynch Nov 2023
To begin with,
We have YOU,
And we have Me.
And we also have THEM, THEY, THEIRS THOSE, WE AND US.
As well, we have:
SOGIES
Asexuals
Allies
Intersexes
Bisexuals
Lesbians
Gays
H­omosexuals
Pansexuals
Queers
Straights
Heterosexuals
Gender Binaries
Afabs
Amabs
Agenders
Androgynes
Gender Blenders
Bigenders
Cisgenders
Cross-dressers
Drag Queens
Drag Kings
Enbies
Gender Dysphoria
Gender fluids
Gender Non-conformists
Gender Queers
Gender Variants
Non-Binaries
Questioners
Transgenders
Transitions
Transs­exuals
Two-Sprits... and
LGBTQIA+
(Flora and Fauna?)

Does Genesis have anything right?
Got a brochure outlining the above and saw a "found poem" in it.
theladyeve Oct 2023
Whispered words and stolen glances,
gloved hands clasp, fingers laced.
Hidden lines and hopeful chances -

In dim-lit parlors, a warm embrace.
Out of the shadows -
A flame.
Ron Sparks Aug 2023
Ignore
racist bigots;
stand proud against their hate.
Trust me when I tell you that you
matter
Wren Aug 2023
I've been listening to La Luna by Belinda Carlisle on repeat for days now. I guess there's nothing particularly odd about daydreaming to intimate love songs. But I feel as though the fantasies I imagine in my head aren't quite the ones the song intended to convey.

Sea salt hair, the sand kissed skin – I can see that.
The cobblestone pathways of small Mediterranean back alleys. Lover's fingers intertwine as they lead each other to the quiet seclusion where is it just them and the moonlight. - It's all clear in my mind.

I think the immersion falls flat when my fantasy involves two lovers who looked like the overgrown emos you see on your tiktok front page. Bright coloured hair, **** cuts, mullets, piercings, the My Chemical Romance t-shirt, cuffed jeans and scuffed up converse. A sense of ****** and binary ambiguity, I do not know who they are. But they're all I can think about.

Yeah, the immersion is definitely broken.
And I, am definitely gay.
G-A-Y. The word almost feels like a jumpscare every time it comes to the forefront of my mind.
So I keep repeating it over and over to try desensitise myself but it never works. The thought fills me with dread, an overwhelming sense of shame and fear. And yet, I still keep listening to that song.
I prefer to call myself Queer for a better term of use.
Queer with a Q that feels like a tender kiss when the word leaves your lips.

Whether I wanted it or not over the past year the walls of heteronormativity began to gradually shatter and I felt as though I was shattering along with it. To see the world through Queer-tinted lenses. It's a beautiful yet overwhelming experience.

To be free? Should feel liberating, but I just feel lost and exposed. A part of myself wishes I'd have had this realisation at 14, 15, 16 even. Anything but 24. I feel a sense of grief for all the life I have wasted, every date I've sat through with straight men who truly believed they were Guts from Berserk, yet their words dripped with the blatant misogyny they were trying so desperately to keep inside.

'Crazy ex girlfriend' I've been her, I've heard of her over 100 times. And yet all of these men are still hung up over her? I find it fascinating that they cant see it's inside themselves they need to look. I guess I still hold a sense of resentment for all the years I spent mothering men who wanted nothing but my body, when my body would recoil at the sight of theirs.

It's not that I'm not attracted to men. I am. In fact my preference is for masculinity, but the difference between masculinity and  the standard straight man is stark.
The standard straight man takes: takes your body, takes your worth, your sanity, your words.
You are perceived but never seen.

There is a softness, a sense of humility within the Queer heart. A silent, unspoken acceptance for whoever you are. Some scream it loudly, for others it's just the small smiles exchanged between each other when you know you both feel comfortable in each others presence. Because you are seen and you are safe.

Safe. A word I am yearning for.
I've not felt it in years now.
Love, A word I am yearning for.
I've not felt it in years now either.

La Luna, whoever you may be. I'm excited to meet you one day.
~I remember when I met you
All the stars were hanging in mid-air
In those moments nothing mattered
But the way you caught me in your stare~
Anam Jul 2023
I can feel,
your heart racing, crying for his touch
Your eyes chase him constantly
while mine chase you just as much

A soft pink color brushes your face
I realize,
he probably looked your way
As I watch you sink deeper in love
I write words
I wish I could say

Love me now or love me later
trust me, doesn't matter
I just hope you love me once
before I drift somewhere farther
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