Gays Can’t Drive
Words have never sat on my tongue well
Never tasted like sweet juleps in summer heat
Or rolled like a Rolls Royce out of my mouth
Instead caught in the cracks of the dirty pavement,
Fallen, shattered as I attempt to say all the words I’ve held
Here in my automatic heart.
There is something ironic about being gay and loving cars.
Always the push and pull of stereotypes
And always my jaw wired shut with fear and confusion
Never able to verbalize all that is here inside me.
So much of being gay is about assimilation
Not being too much of one thing
Or too little of another.
The only way to survive is to be hammered into submission of
Archetypes
But no category fits me well
Knowledge of car models and drag queens clouds my mind
In gay clubs,
But here in a poem,
Here they make since and i can see myself for what i am.
There is no coin in which i am both sides of,
Instead i am the entire spectrum,
both and beyond.
So I’ll gladly paint my face up pretty
And drive down the streets of cities that hate me
But I’ll make damn sure to write about it later
To remember this moment,
The moment of the sky cracking open
To welcome me,
For all I am.