I went to a vigil for ClubQ on Wednesday, it was a wonderful and moving experience but has left me with a lot of fears, anger, and lingering thoughts over my queerness and place in the community. I can’t find the right words to explain it but I did write a poem to get some of it out, it ended up being more of a train of thought rambling but I ended up quite liking it.
My city has a gay district
I’ve never had a community so close
Missing my chance behind a closet door
It still feels so far away
On Sunday 5 are dead
Wednesday is the vigil
We’re used to putting them together
My mom is on the phone
As I wait for my Uber
Not wanting to risk having to worry about my car in a possibly aftermath
Just in case
We’re going over exit strategies
Basic first aid
How to stop bleeding
Mostly for her benefit
I’m too numb to be concerned
Eventually I’m out the door
A drag queen plays the violin
We sing together
An activist read slam poetry
The crowd yells in agreement
To statements of basic human decency
That so many refuse to hear
Tomorrow is thanksgiving
I can’t take going back to my empty apartment
I go to a lesbian bar
But don’t tell my mom
Who doesn’t need more worry
I pass through the safety check points
Empty my bag and pull up my sleeves
The guard apologizes
I say I understand
Within minutes of arrival I’m no longer alone
Taken in by those in a community I still feel outside of
Who knew I needed a home
I drink and dance and live
My mom asks if I made it home
I tell her where I am
She says she loves me and I say it back
For the first time in months
I screenshot the text as the DJ changes songs
I hate dancing
But I can
I can move freely and exist openly
Even if just in that moment
Like they tried to
Like they should have been able to
Like so many people don’t want us to be able to
They can’t dance but I can
So I do
I become a living memorial
To thousands I’ve never met
Who fought for me to have this moment
Whose work is still far from done
I wonder if it ever will be finished
I am surrounded by odd girls and twilight lovers
I am home
And I am dancing
But I am still looking over my shoulder at the guard at the door
Would he be enough
For someone else who reaches their own enough tonight
And decides we are problem they must solve
After hours listening to Jonathan Shelley
Giving sermons on how to shoot us
Lined up facing a wall
Of burning books they never read
Of reading hashtags
Crying “over the children”
Who were taken away by bullets
And the words of families and strangers
Who will never truly know who the child are speaking in front of
And politicians playing preacher, doctor, and therapist
But not by queens
They never bother to think of the people in that room
Us as children once
Fighting to survive and accept and be accepted
A battle too many lost
They don’t us
They don’t see our children
Only seeing the future we work towards for the youth
As a direct threat to their supremacy
To fight hate you must expose our differences
But if our differences no longer divide us
How will they fear monger to gain power
What hot takes will they tweet out
What talking points will they spew on cable news and the New York Times
Between thoughts and Prayers
What power is greater than hate
Nothing they have ever felt in their lives
They may have known love
But they lost it along the way
They will never walk into a lesbian bar
Unsure, alone, and lost
Only for strangers to pick them up
Dust them off
Tell them what a lovely sweater they have
And welcome them not as a stranger but as a person who matters
In a community who needs you
They have never danced as an outlet
As a form of anger and resilience
As a community gathering
But they have seen it’s power
And they are scared
So I will dance
For Kelly
For Raymond
For Ashley
For Daniel
For Derrick
And for everyone who lost or never had the chance to feel the music
To feel the unified strength
To feel free and welcomed and loved
Because there is a power stronger than hate
And I found it dancing in a lesbian bar