I am black.

I am a woman.

I am queer.

My voice gets shut down in three different ways.

I cannot give my two cents because they are worth less.

I will keep shouting though.

I will keep loving myself and her.

Politics? I must be thinking with my skin.

So what if I am sometimes, so are you.

The fields that interest me? Those are for men.

How could I ever figure out those mathematics on my own, without the brain of an alpha boy?

My love? Now there’s a topic that turns everyone into a fire breathing dragon.

How could I know that I love her?

Have I ever loved a man?

No thanks.

I’ll stick with her curves.

I’ll stick with her heart and soul.

I am a black, queer woman and I am erased three different ways.

I will continue to redraw myself.

I am here whether you like it or not.

Intolerance, blocking you out from all the world, shuting you within a small room that may never expand

A manipulative voice that whispers in your ear

It calls to you, tells you that nothing else is right

Your opinion matters, for none can dispute it

It chuckles to itself for the trouble it has caused, and the doubt it has induced

What shall you do, give in or become the bigger person?

For do you have the right to decide?

you don’t know me.how could you we aren’t the same you don’t know me of course you don’t like me thats how it is here I am not your people you are not mine you don’t know me. We grew up in a different place, I perform my music and play football to pay to be educated. You are educated so your rich family back home is pleased

I am not intolerant neither are you

we are just different

so we can not like each other

or love?...

No.You are different thats what they tell me they tell you that too you just insist it’s not true.

well I guess we know that now

we know something

that if things were different we could...

No.

Maybe if things were different but...

we can make them different

how

beauty lies in difference a song is not good unless it has harmonies that are different than the...

melody? Of course you are the melody Ha! what should I expect?

expect nothing from me

I won’t.

ok

ok

You don’t know me. How could you?

Gay was wrong.

Being black raised Christian in Dallas, Tx, I believed it to be true. Unbeknownst to me, there were people part of LGBTQ+ near me. Now I was never out right bigoted, I did give sneers whenever someone mentioned anything “gay”.

In all actuality, I was just pushing things off whenever someone called anything I did gay. I wasn’t the definition of black masculinity.

When I was 12, my mom wanted us to watch a Hallmark movie. It was “Prayers for Bobby”. This young man in a conservative, Christian household was gay. The all American family except for him. They tried to “fix” him but he found love. When he chose to share, he was ostracized and killed himself. The movie turns and the mother learned.

While my brother and mother felt sympathy, they didn’t feel empathy. I did. With my depression, I couldn’t wrap my head around someone being rejected by their family for how they were. That movie hit home for me.

A few years later, my cousin came out of the closet. Of course, our little church got a hold of it and said the meanest shit. I was seeing the movie play out again. I told her I loved her and that it didn’t matter. She was my cousin all the same. Now, I speak up whenever I can. Not just family but with others when something homophobic is uttered.

Accepting someone else because they’re different may seem like a foreign concept but people must realize writing someone off for being different is stupid. Race/love isn’t a choice. Never stay silent. Combat bigotry.

One day I want to ask.

What is it you have against others?

Why are you personally offended by a colour?

Do you use that tone with your mother?

Does your world really break because of other people's lovers?

You were always on the wrong side of history, circling like vultures, the side where the grass was only greener because they rolled out a carpet and called it horticulture.

We don't talk anymore. Not that we ever did much to begin.

Your own fragile life calling everyone else beacons of sin.

Do you really think this is what your God wanted? Hate and destruction and abhorrence flaunted?

Please give me a break, you're not high and righteous. You're starting a fight just to fight against justice.

My memories of school are foggy at best, but we were taught Canon law and let me tell you a jest. The Church believed in tradition, father and son, they also favoured striking down barbaric laws in favour of new ones.

Things change with the times. Get your head out of the clouds. The world is not yours to control, it's ours to turn around.

What happened to peace? Do you miss the war? Calling poor women and children your whores?

You don't need a voice if you ignore those of others. You don't get a choice if it means everyone else's are smothered.

We don't talk anymore. But maybe we should. Maybe if someone set you straight, it would actually do you some good.

My voice is soft. I like quiet spaces, calm, making myself small.

I do not hiss or scratch when trouble arrives and curls against my door.

But your ‘not me’ is loud and heavy now, impossible to carry.

Burdensome, when it is clear you will not shoulder mine.

a scream won’t open closed ears,

a whisper at night:

me too.

A yellow jacket with snap buttons, neon glasses printed on old cotton,

tennies that talk when in motion,

pants tight around my ankles.

Am I missing pieces of myself,

important and irreplaceable?

Your voice, a noisy mantra:

I am not a monster.

That was not the question.

I am an older woman who has never married or had children. I am at peace with that until I try to strike up a conversation with another woman. She inevitably asks if I am a "Mrs." and a "mommy." She quickly learns that I am neither and therefore not a member of "the club." Conversation over, friendship impossible.

“Class, settle down. Let‘s get back to the reading.”

The class silences, as the teacher turns her fiery gaze back down to her bible.

“So what do we think it means when they say “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.”?”

”Yes, Chris?”

”It means being a homo is a sin.“ He laughs.

She replies, in frustration, “You know that is not the proper use of that word. Assuming you meant ‘being gay’, that is correct: being gay is a sin.”

I can only imagine the confusion written all over my face. My teacher looked in my direction; my inner monologue was intensely advising her to call on anyone BUT me. To my relief, her eyes landed on another victim.

My friend, who sat right in front of me, turned in her seat, “Homo. Ha ha” she smirked at me.

“How is being gay a sin? Sin is something we do by choice, right? So why is just simply being gay a sin??” I asked her, honestly wondering how we were supposed to comprehend this.

“I guess you choose to be gay? I’m not sure.” She shrugged.

“Well I don’t choose who I like. Do you?”

“No, I guess not.” She looked down at her jumper, confused now too.

There we sat, 10 years-old and questioning the intellect and reasoning of not only our teacher, but the entire book we had been raised learning.

This was the first time that I questioned the credibility of something I was supposed to blindly believe. This was the first time that I realized that I did not agree with the Bible; and this was the first time that I realized I was going to always be someone that would fight for the unaccepted.

I am fed up with all the arguements

About race, gender and about faith

White, black, man, woman, and everything else people choose to be

About being Christian, Jew or Muslim

About left or right politically

It's all so ignorant, negative and so futile

As we are simply all a part of one human race

We should all be able to get along

All be helping and supporting

Each other like the family we are

Stop the arguments at large

And connect and share the love and kindness

Accept people for who they choose to be

Or what they wish to believe

Or the colour that nature selected for them

It makes no one lesser human beings

We need to be more tolerant and compassionate in feelings.

Father, always believing you are right

Harsh words spilling from your mouth like toxic sludge

You berate them, judge them,

Even though love is love

Why can't you see it?

From your ways, I've learned

Each insult, a lesson engraved in my soul

A reason to live differently,

To live more benevolently than you

To accept all souls of this world

With open arms

From you, I've learned

How to treat others better