Truth Will Always Be Revealed

During the course of a recent conversation with a significant someone in my life. This individual is not a significant other but a significant person in my life. She made mention of her viewing a recent cooking show in which the cook outed himself by having his boyfriend and several gay friends on his show. Show expressed great discern for his being gay and her inability to continue any enjoyment in watching his show any more. 

She was able to relate this feeling to her brother and his friends. She said she loved but she just could not accept him for who he "chose" to be. I sat there in awe of her casual and clear expression. I sat heartbroken. I had thought she was making progress personally towards gay men and women. She seemed to slide back about fifty years all of a sudden.

I sat bewildered as if she had just used her pistol to shoot me in the heart as if this is what she always does on Saturday morning. I asked why she would say something like that. Her response was that she just couldn't change her way of thinking.

I have spent years coming to terms with who I am as a gay man and how it transpires much, if not all, of my life. I slumped. We had a funeral to attend later that afternoon and I thought, maybe we could make it a double funeral because I don't know if I can survive this bomb. I was just blown to smithereens. I know she and I should have had this talk years ago but I figured we didn't need to have the talk since EVERYONE else seemed to know. She apparently thinks it fine for a forty year old man to carry a distinctively femininely fashioned purse everywhere he goes. Not to mention it changes daily to match my outfits. Love! Love! Love! I love me a Vera Bradley bag. Brings me such joy. I have grown accustomed to the stares. I welcome the opportunity to tell someone why I love my purse and where they could buy their own instead of making eyes for mine.

I regressed so fast into my pre-coming out depression. I bought a pack of cigarettes and a new orange lighter. That was my favorite uncle's favorite color. Following the funeral I went home and found solace in a darkened slumber. I refused to even attend the repass. There seemed to be a great throng of mourners and mingling became a challenging burden I did not need to face. Sigh.

The next morning I went to Church for Sunday services. I still couldn't shake the funk. Everyone asked what was wrong. I put on my brave face and went on with the day so as to avoid the truth. But those words of disgust and rejection would not cease from resounding in my head! Those words of disgust and rejection unearthed the really dark past that I buried and believed gone. I am not that same little boy. But life seemed a little less precious after hearing those words. Life seemed a little less worth living after hearing those words. Life just seemed a little less after hearing those words. I guess I am that same little boy. Fearful of bullies, rejection and disgust. Oh my!

I remain in a state of active confusion. I remain alive, but in a state of confusion. I am at the cross roads again. I submitted a coming out poem for publication in a university arts magazine. If it is chosen to be published, all will be revealed.

In my head, torrents of rain beat my nerve vessels while the walls of my skull contract, harshly scrubbing my throbbing brain. Armageddon has begun and it has begun in my head. The world I once roamed proudly as creator and happy citizen is in complete upheaval. Nights are the worse. There is no moon to speak of and the shadows seemed to have gotten darker. Hope is a four letter word that lost its value at the same time the sun lost its reflection.
Rubble is all that remains of a paradise that once graced the landscape of my mind. Rubble and creatures the likes I have never been able to conceive. I feel like I am in a foreign world and yet I know I am in my own head. Sleep is a luxury I seek but rarely find. Nutrition could calm the quakes in my belly but then nutrition too is a luxury I have lost. Life is lived or killed while the darkness passes. I couldn’t tell you how long will the darkness last? I wish I knew. Unfortunately, uncertainty is the only promise. Memories are new nightmares that taught you with a life that will never be again. The songs that celebrated life and love and gave us such joy only demean the nostalgia their sounds bring.
Occasionally I will find spurts of sunshine. They make me want to shed my coats and dressings to let my skin breathe in the sunshine cleaning my filth filled pores. I am heavier from the filth. It fills me like an unwelcomed lover seeking to unload his regrets and fears. I reek of death and despair. It is how I survive. The shadows feed on fresh meat. Sustaining this coat of filth and misery lets me seep through the wretched and displaced stealthily as seek what remnants of light survive.

Insipiration

I'm inspired by friends who are doing the damn thing. Fit and tough they fight a good fight to better lives of men and women who need inspiration to do the same. I've let fears consume me and inhibit my everything that is alive within me. My talent and creativity that at one time thrived is begging for a bit of momentum and direction. There are stories I have wanted to write and share. I have wanted to become and evolve for the past fifteen years. I have had false starts and excuses that have burned me up quicker than I could warm up to the challenge. As the only saboteur to my success, I'm left to admire inspiring people doing the things I think I should be doing. Am I just bitching or this an attempt to talk through a prime issue that has me settled into a 9-5 that I never studied to achieve. Time to prioritize and make a few decisions. Time t show them what I have in me to inspire!

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Sick and tired of being sick and tired

I'm sick and tired of
Being sick and tired
Tired of your anger
Sick of counseling your fears
I just want to live
My life, fight my fears
Reach my dreams
I'm sidelined by your issues
I'm counseling your frightened inner child
Making sure you sleep at night
Comforted that I'm not a threat
My nights are spent wide eyed
In fear, I'm frightened
Your fear will find me vulnerable
I'm threatened by your ignorant inner child

Counsel yourself
Leave me the fuck alone
You'll never remember my name
Much less the dreams I've deferred
In hopes you will find the truth
I'm no threat and just want to live

I'm sick and tired
Of being sick and tired
Of your bullshit politics and
Ego driven rhetoric to count my vote
Among your tricks that kiss your ass
I'm not that one
I'm the nigga you love to hate
The brotha at the end of your line
The man you consider less worthy of humanity
Than the broken pets roadside begging for a bone

I'm a man worthy of justice
Deserving of peace and humanity,
The chance to live outside your broken spirit

I'm sick and tired
Just so tired of this fight

Please

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Freedom

I've chosen the cell I live in. Everyday I hope for release. I pray I find a way out of this confinement I have allowed to hold me. I still have not come out to my Mother. For the past 36 years, my world has spin around her light. My world has been made to allow her light to stay bright. I work each day to maintain order and to keep peace. I keeps my Mother happy. I do.

I do.

Someday I will make amends with the regret but I forgive myself. Too many years have fluttered by for me to be angry. Sometimes I'm sad. Sometimes I'm angry. I resent my truth sometimes. And sometimes I resent my choice. But, I made that choice willfully. I live with the consequences. I live with the anger, resentment, and sadness. I make due. They are my blues. I do. I do.

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The Day After

It's winter and rain clouds blanket the city. We find solace in the routine of urban survival. Masses are out hunting and gathering for an easier demise. There is a solace in contributing to your own well being making yourself less of a burden to society. A lack of entitlement and a greater sense of responsibility make for a noble citizen.

Soldiers of fortune at arms, we are marching, fighting, dying for hope. Hope wakes us from slumber. Hopes fuel dreams that drive our ambitions. Hope allows us to hold onto the past with amorous grips opening ourselves to vulnerability so that we may experience love, joy, triumph and fulfillment.

Hope is freedom.
Hope is love.
Hope is life.

The New Year

New year begins and we pray the energy improves. The air is thick with fear and trepidation. Prayers have doubled to any god who will listen. I can taste the desperation. It rests on my tongue like dew slowly saturating my taste buds as if it were the fourth of July and my tongue just tasted a juicy hamburger made with American cheese and mustard and sweet pickles and I'm filled with freedom and pride eating my red, white and blue burger. Only the taste now is not so salacious. It is bitter and greasy, metallic like blood and it fills me with hurt and regret. I am filled even with the regret of mistakes to come. I pray to my God. I pray for a relief to rinse the despair from my mouth and the good fortune to feel right with what is to come and the role I will assume. Thy will be done. Thy wraiths be merciful. Thy judgement be forgiving.

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