"heteronormativity" poems
LGBT.
You may have never heard of this acronym before,
Or maybe you associate it with liberals, or Obama,
Or hippies.
LGBT stands for:
Lesbian:
I was approached by a straight man
At a gay bar, who asked me if
I wanted to 'have a good time'.
I told him no.
I could see something in his eyes
Flicker, and he asked me why
I told him I only liked women
In that regard
He stood up angrily,
And told me that I was an
Ugly d*ke anyway.
LGBT stands for
Gay:
I was holding hands with
My boyfriend while
We were walking in the park.
We watched an older woman
Walk up to us and say,
"You're going to hell."
I said, "I'll see you there,"
She glared at me before
Storming off in a rage,
mumbling, "Disgusting f*g."
On her way.
LGBT stands for
Bisexual:
I came out to my family today.
My cousin said,
"You're just confused."
My father said,
"Don't you dare walk in
My house with a f*ggot."
My mother said,
"Pick a side."
My supposed "friends" said,
"You're just desperate and greedy."
I've been dating an amazing person
That I can never share if I want to
Stay on good terms with "family".
LGBT stands for
Transgender:
I binded my chest today
With Ace bandages even though
I know it's extremely unsafe
Because I didn't want to be
Seen as a girl again.
I finally cut my own hair
And when I told my mom why
She told me,
"Leave before your father gets home."
I am sleeping on my friend's couch tonight
Because my parents couldn't accept me
As their son.
You might associate the acronym LGBT
With liberals.
Liberals that don't use their religion as an
Excuse when they're really just scared.
Or Obama who said, "No one in America
Should be scared to walk down the street
Holding the hand of the person they love."
Or hippies who refuse to conform to
Heteronormativity, because it only matters
That you love, the who or when or where or why or
How
Doesn't matter nearly as much.
People are more than their secondary ***
Characteristics.
"Love thy neighbor as thyself", right?
Apr 4, 2019
Apr 4, 2019 at 10:02 PM UTC
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
May 18, 2014
May 18, 2014 at 9:20 PM UTC
Blue skies and apple pies
Football games and guns to aim
40 hours of work and fireworks
Heteronormativity and conformity
White tranquility in the midst of police brutality
White terrorism claiming nationalism
What is the American Dream?
Shutdowns and cages and riches for ages
Fascism raises from hateful rampages
Families taken away from their own
These are a few of Trump's favorite things.
What is the American dream?
A flag always at half-mast
In preparation for the next mass shooting
Killing the poor with a minimum wage
That can't even afford rent
Mocking the people we stole this land from.
America the land of the free
Construct of the patriarchy
Thousands of dollars in medical bills
Treating our oceans like landfills.
Oh say can you see by the dawn's early light
A country so broken the end is in sight.
Capitalistic ideals that possess the rich
Destroying the poor as we're thrown in a ditch
Together we must rise above
And show Trump's cult what we're made of.
Jan 23, 2019
Jan 23, 2019 at 10:02 PM UTC
Auntie Em is calling….
I was just getting to love my Emerald City
The shiny feel of it, its sweetly diverse demi-monde.
Its shimmering green beauty and tranquil sense of safety.
The heels of my ruby red slippers were well & truly dug in.
But no, the state fair balloon stands before me tied up & ready to go.
A grand exclamation mark in my way if ever there was one.
And Toto for once has gone mute, no chance of a last minute hold up.
"Dorothy, Dorothy, where are you?"
I guess it must have been too fantastical a dream to be true.
A time for goodbyes.
I’m embracing the Lion telling him to always be proud of himself & not to walk unafraid.
The Tin Man’s gentle open heartedness I compliment him on as we both shed tears.
The Scarecrow I kiss and thank for his loyalty & grace under fiery pressure.
With a heavy heart, I climb that first tentative step on the block.
"We’re sick with worry over you"
I could be angry but the wise words of the mystic ring loudly in my year.
I do need to go back – My Auntie Em is really calling me.
Calling me back to the grey flatlands of home.
Back to the numbness of small town heteronormativity.
Where Twisters rarely every came by to sweep you away and save you.
I could only keep singing ‘Over The Rainbow’ in vain hope.
"Find yourself a place where you won't get into any trouble!
Unlike Dorothy Gale, this Dorothy left Kansas voluntarily
The long yellow brick road finally took me under the rainbow and on to my Emerald City
I no longer pined for home but knew all along that it would call me back one day.
And so here I am, drifting higher & higher away from my adopted home.
Perhaps I need to build a revolving door when I get there to pass through both worlds easily
Or perhaps bring something of the rainbow back to illuminate the grey-lands.
Or perhaps – in reality - some reconciliation between these worlds is in order.
Perhaps.
It’s time to slip on the ruby red slippers and prepare the way for Kansas.
Yes, this Dorothy has surrendered but
I always had the power to be me, my dear.
I just had to learn it for myself.
August –September 2018
Sep 16, 2018
Sep 16, 2018 at 10:46 PM UTC
We live in a straight world.
You might not think it’s true,
“Gays are coming out everyday
could be them next or her,
maybe you too”
Well I’ll take a minute to prove it to you.
If I told you I’m into girls
I’d see your brain short circuit in real time,
“But you don’t look gay” you’d say.
“Straight passing” is what they call
a girl like me, who still looks feminine
but doesn’t want the D.
This “luxury” of remaining in the closet
is really hurting my game,
Added another straight boy
to my list of those who lost it
when they heard me exclaim,
“I appreciate the offer, but I’m gay”
Let’s not forget the most important issue
“Gays will ruin the sanctity of marriage”
Here, I’ll hand you the tissues.
Man and woman, hand in hand, till death do they part,
and yet more than half of all marriages
end in the perfected art of divorce.
Far be it from me,
to take anyone’s right
to do and say what they want,
while you embrace the hate
and live fighting the inevitable reality
of any queer couple tying the knot.
It might be 2018,
but I still can’t hold a potential partner’s hand
in a public facility
without getting disgusted leers
and a dreadful look at multiple cases
of unprovoked hostility.
So, try to look me in the eyes,
And tell me I’m not right.
But despite it all
I’ll keep my head up high
And let that rainbow flag fly
Because this might be a straight world,
But love is love
is love
is love.
And that concludes this winded verse.
Mar 27, 2018
Mar 27, 2018 at 10:05 PM UTC
They asked us to think of the person we respected the most in our lives.
Once we had that person in our thoughts they continued,
"Now, write a letter to them coming out"
My throat hitched and I felt my chin start to quiver,
One kid called out, "But I'm not gay?"
That isn't the point of the exercise, Michael.
My mother always told me when I cried my chin looked like a walnut because of the way I scrunched it up in attempt to keep from sobbing.
And in that moment I knew my chin was contorting into a nut and my eyes began to burn,
Because am I?
The constant names and ridicule, "You're a **** *you're a **** **you're a **** spit at me like venom after I donated my hair,
The family jokes of, "So you have a boyfriend yet?"
No.
"A girlfriend then?"
The countless times I have walked downstairs in the morning only to hear my mother say, "You look like a lesbian" and laugh because I didn't feel like putting on makeup that day.
I had spent my entire high school career terrified of the thought of being gay.
But so what?
What if I am?
Why does it feel like being gay is wrong?
The word "gay" is used as an insult time and time again.
If you're not straight then you're not normal.
Normal?
We have to crush this assumption that heterosexuality is a must, that it's the norm.
The LGBTQ community needs you.
We need acceptance.
Someone should not feel threatened due to their sexuality.
That exercise, of writing a letter to your idol coming out, shouldn't even need to exist.
Coming out shouldn't be so scary, so difficult.
We need to learn and to accept one another.
We can't place such negative connotations about being gay, or trans, or pan, or bi, or anything but straight and cis into the youths head,
because then they end up terrified and confused,
just as I was.
Please,
We need to save these kids.
Feb 2, 2017
Feb 2, 2017 at 10:38 AM UTC
She was a stranger.
Cute, freckled, one of the most beautiful smiles.
And when she looked at me it felt right.
He was a stranger.
Nice eyes, a full beard, tall and burly.
His eyes glanced my way one too many times to be coincidental.
With her I felt comfortable, at ease.
It felt right to smile at her and laugh with her,
and even though I knew it would go nowhere it made me happy.
With him I felt a dull excitement, a small thrill.
It felt good knowing that there was a man around that wanted me,
even though I was sure that I didn't want him.
And that is how I know.
Because laughing and smiling at a new girl felt closer to love
than the lingering lustful looks of an unknown man I was told already wanted me.
I used to grasp onto the smallest bit of attention from a man,
falling over myself with feelings at the mere possibility of being loved by one. Its been years since I've felt that way, I've outgrown the falsehoods about what I thought I knew.
I belong with a woman, I just know I do.
Jun 28, 2018
Jun 28, 2018 at 10:20 PM UTC
On the street, I have to pretend.
School, work.
Home, church.
I pretend.
To be cis.
To be straight.
To be everything everyone wants me to be.
But when I get by myself,
And shut my bedroom door,
I can breathe again.
I take off society’s rules,
I shake off gender roles.
I close the door on heteronormativity,
And I toss “She” in the trash.
I am me again. “Thank God.”
Dec 16, 2016
Dec 16, 2016 at 12:13 PM UTC
My vains, they're coursing with ink from all the words I did not say, from all the details about me I did not care to share.
Because what could I say to make you understand the pain of hiding me away?
The boulder of emotion that drops down and ignites the empty hole where my heart should be every time you speak of a future that I would rather not have at all than go along with your plans.
The flinch I suppress whenever you speak of a husband or kids that I would be forced to bear in your oh so pink future,
Pink that is so bright in your eyes but dark and dripping in mine.
The decision I make as my hands dig into my chest in an attempt to reach up into my heart and relieve the pain of being ashamed of what I am- of who I am.
It's becoming too much!
The waiting
for the perfect moment to let the ink pour from my tongue all over your too clean floor.
The fear of your reaction knowing your liberal approach is only for what you've been taught is right to love and wrong to hate, knowing that you do not want to learn and believe in anything you deem as new.
The step back I take as I ask myself;
"Is it really worth it?"
Telling myself that I don't owe you ****
You have sowed the seeds of self hate with your casual heteronormativity in my mind and now you have no right to its flowers whose colorful petals I have struggled to maintain.
But even back here, it's getting hard to ignore the spark of the possibility of freedom that turned into a fire ready to consume my mind and body.
The hope that you will accept me for simply being me. That you will put down the raging flames of worry in my heart.
The smoke is far too close to my lunges to keep me hidden any longer.
Each breath comes shorter as time goes by, the heavy numbness of a fainting spell on my doorstep.
The answer.
YOUR answer, the part that will either burn me with the scorching shock of your disbelief or will carry me to peace by the black river of your reassurance.
My story,
the one you hear right now,
that will never be finished for the smoke has choked me as the ink came raining down my eyes, down my throat, in a vain attempt to keep the fire at bay.
Dec 21, 2019
Dec 21, 2019 at 3:40 PM UTC
"I didn't know you were Queer."
What made you think I was straight?
Feb 20, 2019
Feb 20, 2019 at 9:47 AM UTC
_ _ , _ _ , 2 0 1 9 is a day gone to the ashes of kismet’s pages
the midday zephyrs and wino meditations that ran through streets like rainfall now live in the hippocampus
the bright side’s gone with the dark
the whole day, for what it was, is no longer
and it bugs me out
that through any endless combo of permutations and planetary rotations, the same circumstances that built the ground of yesterday
will never repeat
or will they?
I’ll never know like the licks that reduce a Tootsie Pop to crumbs
I’m not intelligent, I’m dumb
because it took me 27 years to learn the value of 24 hours
to learn that a lotus bloom is something to treasure ten times more than scraps of pure gold
we are the children of nature
what does that make our creations?
Humans birthed a cosmos
of currencies and chambers of computer generated concoctions. . .
are they not descendants of the Mother?
In some abstract way?
Idk, dude, I’m out of it,
if you know me, you know exactly what that means - -
but I digress - -
It’s just that I never got the chance to tell the day how grateful I was to have it
and I now know that wasting time is a luxury modern civilization can enjoy after epochs and eras
this day and age is as far from perfect
as the brain is from perfection,
tech grew faster than the collective consciousness
and we still limit worth and love
to skin and heteronormativity
but at least
for a small sliver of time
things were, in a single moment
.
.
.
pretty good.
Aug 4, 2021
Aug 4, 2021 at 6:48 PM UTC