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Dante Rocío Jun 2020
I live in some way on the edge of the world of the senses. I prolong my life with books, minute thrillances in the honourable existing through consciousness, Poetry, and I live from feelings, reflections. I barely spend time with my peers, I go to the city only when it is necessary, I don't know how to use Snapchat, Tik Tok, I don't listen to pop music, and since I don't have Facebook, you may not even consider me real. I don't engage in news, top trends or political issues. To put it in a nut shell, I am quite secluded from the global civilization.

However, something grave has recently been ignited and only two days ago did I realize what kind of slander is really happening in the country I currently am. Repressions against those who love/act differently. For what we feel, who we are with, that one wears pink or rainbow, that they are not what tradition or the wont of others expect. I saw the proud "LGBT FREE ZONE" boards on the photos. Joyful cleaning of the streets after pride marches, as if the plague of Albert Camus had passed there. Seeing non-heterosexual people as ****, like pariahs in India. That a student of one of my teachers cannot even give a new person their email due to fear. And a large part of Poland is even fine with it. To put it short, in humanitarian terms, we went back to the Victorian era or the Spanish conquests in a sense.

I do not know anything about politics. Sometimes I do not even remember who is the Prime Minister of Poland. And for many who are reading it now and don't know me, I can be nobody. But I know that I am in a way a pilgrim here and a heraldry of freedom for the world, now or later. And I have to do, give something from myself, because although words sometimes fail to express so much, at times, like dreams, they are the only thing we have left. So I write, I do what I can. Because someone has to say something more specifically.

In 2015, Chris Pueyo, a Spanish student from Madrid, published his poetic novel "El Chico de las Estrellas" ("The Star Boy") where he wrote his autobiography through his eyes and those of the third person. Without shame, he described his loves, ups and downs, the harassment from the hands  of the world surrounding him, and all the tears and his own blades of guilt and glory he had experienced and born, mainly because of his homosexual orientation, also to support others like him. So far no one has translated it into any other language and it is stuck in Spain and the countries of the South America. But I will change that. I've decided to be the first to do it. Although I'm not after any studies nor am I more than 18 years old. But I do it wonderfully, I have determination and love for the language as a person. And I have a goal. At first I thought it was because of my admiration for Chris's work and my desire to simply show it, but now I know that's not the point.

I'm doing this for You. Because in this country we lack books that free love from definitions, frames, books that discourse about our bodies or passion with their due admiration, truth and purity. So know that from now on I dedicate my work to You. To those to whom are clipped wings, words and hopes, to those who hide and want to love madly and without boundaries. To the colourful girls from my class who are not afraid to be all the shades of the rainbow with piercing and who supported me in difficult moments. To the aforementioned student of my singing teacher. I'm almost halfway through the book, I'm still waiting for an answer from the next publishers. I won't rest till I publish it for You and other personalities, even if, like J.K. Rowling, I have to go to 12 of them, because maybe those people are afraid of publishing it.

Less than a year ago I didn't know anything about LGBTQ+, I still haven't experienced any romantic perturbations in my life or ever fallen in love with any human. But thanks to the work of writers like Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Becky Albertalli, Chris Pueyo, many fanfics, articles or my own questions, I have seen how beautifully infinite, complex and simple love is, that there is nothing in it against the nature. I study God in the world, the Bible or the Koran, and I’m telling tell you that even there, in the depth of the verses, there is no absurd condemnation! I have gone through the issues of  defamed *** or nakedness into taboo and I’m saying to you: it is not unclean, forbidden, it is simply a corporeal act of devotion, our naked body is pride, not shame! Gender equality is not only the equality of man and woman, but of every person with the rest of the society. I have never experienced any serious harassment, pressure in the matter of my objects of affection, I admit it, but I do know what it's like when society wants to nail you to your biological age, body, gender, name and other ephemeral content on your ID card. Literally existential ****, in blood-stained handcuffs.

The main part of my being is The Poet. To be more precise, a "non-writing” one - poems are only a necessary medium to save my Poetry from the time, and the real one are my gestures, the doe eyes that the sky is clad in, thoughts, breath and feelings. So my task here is not forming rhymes and things into empty beauty yet bearing myself again and again in intimacy and metaphors more literal than the prose, between the verses. It is not a job, yet, for me, the most honourable identity. The path to my Home in the tears, grass, the Sacrality of Life, Myself. For this is My Love, Lover. I’m not joking. This is why I know such love and devotion though I’ve never been with any human in an intimate relationship. This doesn’t have ***, borders. Ergo I’ve never gave myself any name of my orientation, I don’t know what it would be and I don’t need to name it. I’m also a revolutionist at heart, I adore the vocal expression of the rebellion, therefore this is why I’m here. And I hope that I will be given the honour of being seen as one of You. Because this is pride. In the pride month.

I’m giving to You support greater than the word “YES” does it. My stance. And, finally, my poems. I dedicate them to You too, written partially especially due to the events taking place right now. I’m giving to Your hands my confessions entitled “And Who Are You To Be?” and “Of Feminine Touch, Of Masculine Sight”.

Don’t you ever let any being constrict your incalescent beauty of wonder. Don’t you ever let anyone claim you to be only a part of scheme, your job or any other miscellany in the bin. Just like You, I am the greatest wonder the history could have ever seen. Each one of us, on our own.

And one more thing, in reference to “The Star Boy”:
In this dead world, where dreams come
barefoot and unkempt to Nowhere,
let’s dance, like Lady Madrid,
with anarchy in the hair.
This time I'm not writing in poems or any literary style. I'm giving a discourse I want to share with all the LGBTQ+ people and many others who might need it, even if it seems to be little to some. Yet I gave something from myself. This is my English version of it since the original one was in Polish due to all that macabre taking place in Poland right now the most. I invite all the eager to read it and keep it in their heart.
I am with You. Wish you all the greatness. Hope I did well.
Tess Aug 2018
If I switched the letter, my name was Air.
I thought it might be a great thing to be the air.
I could be something and nothing at the same time. I could be necessary and also invisible. Everyone would need me and no one would be able to see me.

-Aristotle and Dante discover the secrets of the Universe.
Author: Benjamin Alire Saenz.
A quote from one of my favorite books.
Ed May 18
“The Summer sun was not meant for boys like me and you.
Boys like us belonged to the rain.” -Benjamin Alire Saenz

Autumn to me, is the season of us:
Unmade duvets, blanketing
Cool shadow and petrichor.
Grounding and welcome. Alive.

Misspelt names on carefree coffees.
Train trip adventures. Nothing feels real;
A wash of memories I can’t recall.
I felt content to feel so.

When I was with you it was Autumn.
Spring-born leaves falling in a rush, so thrilling to see.
Like the butterflies in my stomach, finally allowed to see the sun.
When you’re not around I’m cold. Numbed.

--

You don’t remind me of Spring.
Spring is not a love that I could share, for
A time of prosperity- I toiled to grow,
Secure in a way that transcended loneliness.

Ripe, I was mine to let go and
I let you pluck; rooted deep down,
No matter how ripe the fruit, it falls raw all the same.
We longed for the fleeting sweet taste.

Aren’t the most tragic fates always the most beautiful?
Does pain make the product sweeter?
You must be left in the cold to be warmed again. And
No amount of burning in the Summer can soothe the Winter woe,

--

As Autumn comes, I curl up alone.
Aching in the comfort of corners, the arms of shadows,
I’m not numb. I wish I was. I’m trying to be.
Now it’s the season to drink and to think and

To fabricate ****** little rhymes
Alone, like I feel I’ve fabricated you.
In the early hours of the morning,
Why I can’t face another new day to taint.

Clinging desperately to book-romance so I might be lost in the pages-
Envious of the securely typed warmth that melts my molten heart.
Contorted to watch scary films, so I might feel anything but myself.
Cutting beautiful music straight through my ears.

Praying, begging to be carried off,
By the adrenaline, as my heart races,
To the cliffs and the call of the sea and the spray.
Nowhere will ever feel free enough from you.

--

All the leaves have fallen.
My fruit and life has wilted and withered.
Roots writhing, doubled over in choked sobs.
But it’s not your fault, I know that.

My trees are bare for a Winter.
I can’t even wear that hoodie anymore-
It holds too many memories,
Of duvet cuddles, Of blanketing, cool dark and petrichor.

Of a boy who never even wore it.
Of a boy I meet in my mind.
Of a boy more radiant, more loving, more nurturing than any Summer I’ve ever known,
That could never keep me warm himself.

Maybe we were not meant for Summer.
Maybe I was fated for the moon,
Just out of your reach.
A perfect pair eclipsed in the wrong time.

Maybe this is just our Autumn.
We fell in love in October,
And I know you didn’t mean to,
But you broke my heart in fall.

— The End —