I’m Gay

and that pisses you off
doesn’t it?
It drives you crazy
that I’m gay.
Did I mention I’m gay?
GAY GAY GAY GAY.
How do you like them apples?
All you heteros are the same
always hating on the gay.
Heteros can talk about sex all the time
but when a gay man mentions it
the shit hits the fan.
Every time you mention your wives
or your children
or your weddings
you’re talking about sex
but when a gay man does it
oh that really gets your gizzard.
Every time you mention your jobs
or your dogs or your
house or your cars or your fucking
lawn mowers
you’re talking about sex
but if a gay man talks about it
look out
everybody gets uptight and freaky.
Sorry if you don’t like hearing
about the fact that I’m gay.
That’s your own problem.
You have issues with the gay man
and you need to deal with your insecurities
regarding the gay man.
I’m gay in the morning
gay at lunchtime
and gay in the evening
and the fact that you can’t accept that
is sad.
I shouldn’t have to keep it a secret
just because you hate hearing it.
There’s nothing unnatural
about being gay.
In fact being gay
is the most natural thing there is.
You didn’t say it,
you don’t have to say it,
you’re thinking it.
In fact you don’t even have to THINK it,
just by existing, just by breathing
you stand against the gay man.
The gay man understands
the hetero mind, the gay man
gets it, the gay man
is an enlightened species, ahead of his time.
Sorry it bothers you so much,
macho Neanderthal.
All heteros are secretly gay anyway.
All us openly gay men know that.
We know the truth.
It’s only obvious.
You’d be amazed at how free you feel
when you admit you’re gay.
It’s like a great weight is lifted
and you don’t have to hide or pretend anymore
or prove anything to anybody.
I’m gay: embrace it!
How come you’re not celebrating me?
Hatred, pure and simple.
You’ve got a real problem.
You’re fucked in the head.
I’m gay and I’m not ashamed of it and
you can’t make me feel bad about myself
no matter how hard you try.
And oh how you try!
It’s all you heteros think about!
You’re obsessed!
Keep trying, hetero trash, it’s not going to work!
I’m gay and proud of it!
That really gets your goat doesn’t it?
You just can’t hardly stand it.
It must get tiring reminding people all the time
that you’re not gay, doesn’t it
eat at your soul?
Try thinking of something else once in a while!
Let me tell you something,
hetero scum:
the gay man doesn’t care about you,
the gay man just wants to be free to be gay.
That’s it, that’s all:
gay and free, free and gay.
You should try it,
you’d like it.
Nobody would have to know.
It could be our secret.

Writers’ Bios

“I am just
a teller of tales, eternally grateful for this
opportunity to amaze and entertain.”

“I love to inhabit my imagination
with characters that are nothing like me
and yet, somehow
eerily familiar.”

“My stories are like my children,
I nurture them, I feed them, and they teach me
so many wondrous things.”

“I love language, I just
love language so, so
very much.”

“After being an addict for 2 excruciating months,
I turned to writing
and it saved me.
I hope my writing might save others.”

“Perfectly ordered words are my nirvana.”

“My carefully crafted words can be found in…
(list of 94 journals)”

“I made a lot of money
and retired at age 53, so I
took up the art
of writing.”

“I just love to imagine
characters and put them in
motion. You never know what they
are going to do!”

“Things are depressing
in this world. I prefer not to
think about that. I make my own worlds.”

“I do not command the muse. The muse
commands me.
The muse speaks through me.
I am a conduit.
You can’t question
the muse, you must simply allow it to
flow through you.”

“I started reading when I was
6 months old, so I guess you could say
it all started there.”

“I have had every job imaginable, waitress to poetry
teacher to poetry adjunct teacher to
full time mother.”

“If I could not write, I would die. Period.”

“I am what one might term ‘congenitally creative.’
I can’t help it. My imagination simply
soars like an eagle. It’s a blessing, and, of course,
a curse.”

“Writing is next to godliness. And I say that
in all humility.”

“I just like to paint pictures with words.
My pencil is my brush,
as it were.”

“I have two BAs, an MA, an MFA and am working on
my PhD in creative writing
with an emphasis
on poetry. I have been published
in my hometown newspaper,
twice.”

“I am an empath. I see pain and I inhabit that pain
while crafting it into a pleasing form. One day
I am sure this will lead to madness.”

“I am just a humble chronicler of the
silliness, vanity and occasional tenderness
and holiness of man, much like the writers
of the Bible.”

Anaphylaxis

I wake up with my face and lips swollen
like a balloon animal made by a sick mime.

An Urgent Care nurse pumps
antihistamine into my left butt cheek.

2 mornings later my scrotum blows up,
a hairy pufferfish that terrifies me.

I gulp Benadryl
as if they were antipsychotics.

Next week my uvula enrages
like a smashed cartoon thumb,

tonsils thick as sand bags, tongue fat as a trout,
throat a slamming metal

prison door. I’m in the park
and people are afraid of me.

I open my eyes in the hospital.
I’m allergic to something

in the air, in the earth,
in myself, some horrible new bloom. That cliff

I fell off of in the park
was just a 6-inch curb, but I saw Death

on my way down.
He was standing with a black umbrella

on the slope of brown grass
in the empty amphitheater, and he looked

so alone.