content warning: usage of the f-slur (f*g) as a device; discussion of being lgbtq+ and discrimination; sexual harrassment and threats

 

i am not the right kind of queer.

my existence is a debate and discourse,

and folks like to say

i’m not real –

– ly queer –

i’m lying

i don’t face discrimination.

 

(my first rape threat came

when i was twelve,

as a joke,

poorly made.

they stopped being jokes

at nineteen

when i first said “i’m ace”)

 

i read words that said,

“pete buttigieg is just a fag”.

beige. milquetoast.

white picket fence and

respectable.

there is no stopping

the people who hate queerness.

 

i am not the right kind of queer.

i am two steps left.

demand i fit in boxes, say

i’m bad for overflowing.

i can’t tell you my gender

(“it feels like” different when i touch it),

but i can tell you i never fit in,

can tell you ‘girl’ settled oddly

and ‘woman’ fit like too-small clothes and a scratchy blanket,

and when i was sixteen i fell in love with a girl

and cried when she wasn’t my first kiss

(i didn’t know).

 

kick me out if you want,

i’m used to it.

i have to build rocks and cages,

have to hunker down with the ones like me,

have to be willing to take a bullet

whenever i try to insist

“i’m here”.

 

i’m in-between and outside,

not the right kind of queer,

but no such thing as being the right kind,

anyway.

just being people,

writing labels,

finding ourselves.

and trust me when i say,

you’re not the right kind either.

not to them.