My Own Gay Body

I'm not entirely sure when I realized that I was a homogay. Sure, there were intensely clear hints as I grew up: playing gynecologist with female friends, thieving my brother's baggy grunge clothing (wish I'd gone the Angela Chase grunge-route instead), awkwardly dependent relationships with a few female teachers, running through boyfriends more out of boredom than excitement. I developed a massive, heart-tripping crush on a female manager at my first job (I was 17), and that carried me through a handful of boys that tried, in vain, to get my undeterred attention. She must have been my catalyst, as she was the first woman I confessed those churning feelings to; the letdown was gentle and unbelievably kind. (I am still not convinced she is not of my female persuasion, but alas, I imagine I may never know.)

I didn't come out (via a letter I left in my parents' bedroom before I went to work) officially until I had my first girlfriend, and while my mom definitely cried (she says because I wouldn't have a wedding, etc), it just... was. No fight, no disownment, no challenge, no beg for reconsideration. My brother cited that we could now check out girls together. My mom had actually, it turns out, been planning on taking me to lunch and asking me if I was gay. I think she was relieved I headed her off and eliminated the need for that. AND HOW AWKWARD WOULD THAT HAVE BEEN.

I came out at the age of 20. It was a good age for realization and personal gay growth: slightly too young to abscond into the darkness and carnival-esque nightlife of young homogays, and two years past high school, where I never would have emerged as gay. At 20, I was mostly free. I could pick whom I wanted to tell, and deliberately avoid conversations with people that didn't need to know. I wasn't wearing rainbows, wasn't sporting any kind of alternative lifestyle haircut (I waited till I moved to FL before I took the axe to my long hair), wore men's jeans simply for comfort, and had, like, a Phish sticker on my black 1995  VW Jetta. I was gay, I was okay, and the world was still spinning on its axis.

That was 10 years ago. A lot has happened since then: one move to FL and back, a handful of serious relationships, some not so much, a well-rounded trail of heartbreak, completion of my bachelor's degree, getting a Real Job Teaching, meeting the woman of my dreams, lusting after the woman of my dreams for 3 mostly silent years, capturing the woman of my dreams, completing my Master's degree, continuing to Teach.

And to cut through my long-winded chase, that's where all of this is going. The Teaching. To be exact, we're going back to high school.

Why, you ask? Why did I choose to teach high school? Simply, I like teenagers. I truly do. I could not teach elementary level because I am not skilled at math and I don't know what to do with little kids, and I really, wholly do not want to teach middle school because I loathed my own middle school experience and cannot fathom purposely or intentionally going back. Also, I dislike clinginess, and middle schoolers are clingy.

So, high school. I guess, in some ways, I became a high school teacher because I would have loved to have myself as a teacher. I know, ego, but some of that is the gay element. I did not have a single out gay teacher in all my years of public schooling. I also somehow eclipsed this in two different colleges. Wait, that's a lie: one gay male professor as an undergrad. I knew who the lesbian professor was in the English department, but never had her. Oh, I lied again. I did have an out lesbian professor in grad school. But that's generally far more common than in high school, or middle school.

IN FACT. I did have a gay teacher in high school, two perhaps, but they were absolutely, concretely, definitively closeted. So much so that one married a (gay) man. I mean, really.

So here I am -- the gaymo high school English teacher. My first year, I had very, very short hair. I ended up growing it out over three years only to cut it off again last year. While I very rarely outright announce my sexuality (I say "rarely" and mean "practically never"), kids do pick up on it. I am not overtly feminine. I do not wear skirts/dresses/very trendy clothing. I look cute, practical, comfortable, sometimes quite gay. My mannerisms in the classroom are sarcastic, pot-stirring, entertaining, slightly off-the-wall. I am a hardass in the sense that I have high expectations and stick to them. I am learning to use high support with the high control. But I have always been soft on the inside. I will not be manipulated, but I pay attention, and I know when my kids are off. Because of some rough experiences and lessons learned my first two years of teaching, I have a hard time being That Person for my students. I can't be the counselor. A) It's not my job, and B) It's too draining to balance that with teaching. But I do care. It takes a close look to see it, but I do. And they know it. Okay, fine: some of them know it.

Within my caring, I shield myself from them. I have often lied and spun stories about how I am married to a man who lives in another state because of his job. That was the general story for my first two years because so many kids asked, and I didn't know how to deflect. Part of me still believes that these kids don't need to know anything about me, but I falter with that when it comes to the kids who need a good role model: gay or not. Why lie? To protect them? Weird/maybe/I don't know. To protect myself? From what?

From parents. Parents are my biggest fear. I can handle rumors and lies, mostly, but parents are an entirely different game, and one I really, really, really hate playing. I have a lot of fear regarding the stories kids spin to their parents, and that alone often pushes me back into the book-filled closet in my classroom. Now, I have no doubt that most parents, upon meeting me, pick up on my gayness, as most moderately open-minded adults do. That I can't hide, and don't care to. It's the in-between, the kids knowing and disliking/not understanding/fearing, that scares the living shit out of me. I worry about how that translates to their parents, particularly those who are not open-minded.

I'm not saying I should walk in to class on the first day and say, "Hi, I'm Ms. ______, and I'm a homogay." That's not what I'm angling for; do heterosexuals do that? Obvs not. I shouldn't ever have to announce my sexuality because it is not the determining factor in who I am, nor is it something anyone needs to be concerned about. And yet, sometimes, I want kids to know because I want them to see that it doesn't matter. Over the past two years, I have been called out by some of my students. And I have not had a negative response or reaction. When they call me out, and there's a certain comfort level already established, I don't back down, and I don't lie. Consistently, it is my "minority" or "low class" or "already gay" students that call me out -- and they do not care. They'll actually ask me about my girlfriend. It is completely normal, and dammit, it's cute.

Not cute, however, are the words that have recently been thrown around my classroom. Among these are: Homo, Fag, Gay, He-She. And when referring to my beloved Rachel Maddow READ poster: Lez-be-real and Lez-be-honest.

I do not, cannot, let this fly unnoticed. I notice, and I face head first. I will not have an unsafe classroom environment. The response has largely been (feigned) innocence that translates quickly into (purposeful) ignorance. The culprits are all boys, save one girl with the "He-She." The boys have been troublesome. Their ignorance is cutting me in new ways. It's too early in the year for them to have picked up on me being gay unless they picked up on it via one of my former in-the-know students. And none of the comments were directed toward me. Had they been, I would not be writing this as it would have been handled in a very different way. Does that sound ominous? Yeah, good, because I seriously don't know how I would have handled it. Anyway.

Some may view these words as meaningless, insignificant, not harming anyone because they weren't directed at anyone, necessarily, they were just tossed around without thinking about the possible effects on an innocent bystander/listener. I don't. I don't think that, believe that, or ever will. For all intensive purposes, I was the silent gay kid in high school, completely unprepared to come out. I heard those words. They were not directed at me (at least never to my knowledge; I put up a damn good hetero front), but I heard them, and must have felt them in some way. I don't _ever_ recall any teacher standing up against the language. Believe me, I know what I'm dealing with here: ignorant 14 and 15 year old boys who are terrified of anyone thinking they're gay, so they super deflect by using the words in a derogatory way so that everyone knows they don't like gay people, and therefore could not be gay themselves. I get that, I absolutely do. I was the girl in middle school that started a rumor that another girl was a lesbian because I didn't want anyone thinking I was the lesbian (funny how that worked out, of course, seeing as I am the lesbian, and that girl definitely is not). I get the deflection, the self-protection, especially when there's an internal fear that you might be the gay one.

But the difference between me and the teachers of my past is that I won't stand for it. I won't hear the language and ignore it. I will meet it head-on and take it down, vowel by vowel, disarming its power and working everyone back into an environment, even just for 90 minutes a day, where it's safe to be  who you are, even if you don't know exactly who that is just yet.

reflection is not what the mirror provides

in pictures you are a ghost
legs tangled together
a trail of bruises, scratches, unidentified
mishaps line your calves
your thighs disappear beneath the bulk
of your laptop
and a cat stretches his paws
over your kneecap
i can't see your face,
your hands,
not even a torso
to distinguish a beating heart
i deprive you of life
in these shiny rectangles of "memory"
because you can't teach the heart to remember
lies

Every five years or so I look back on my life

.... and have a good laugh.

From 7.21.05:

I want: to shave my head, to cover my arms with ink, to further diminish my curves, to wear my glasses more often, to cut my wardrobe in half, to finish school, to get a job at an accepting alternative type high school where I am free to be who I want to be no matter what the day or month, to write and be successful with my craft.

And I will.


I penned that during the summer before my final year of undergrad work, while I was in a dying relationship with a woman I rarely see, and never speak to, now. I was working in a bookstore, which had its perks. I was fumbling through a world I didn't really fit into. At that time, I think I had about 3 tattoos.

I still want more, I still want to "cover my arms with ink."

I never shaved my head... the hair has grown, been chopped off twice, grown again, and now is short. And that's my comfort. For the moment, anyway. It's me. For now, I think.

I never got rid of my curves. I probably never will. These hips are here to stay, jutting as they are at times. I still don't love my curves, but I do love my body. 90% of the time, anyway, mostly.

I want lasik, not glasses.

I could be on an episode of Hoarders for the amount of t-shirts I own. And I'm not ashamed.

I finished school, quite well, and got that job teaching high school. But: this is not an alternative, terribly accepting place of employment. It's accepting enough, but I'm not protected, and truth be told, this is not the job I want for the rest of my working life. It's not even the job I aim to have in five years. In 8-9 short-ish months, I will be finished with my MA in English and then... then I can begin to find a new path.

Don't get me started on the writing. And how unbelievably it leaves me.



There is just so much more I want to be.

(never again)

my girlfriend wants me to write in black and white
stray the obtuse to another universe
and i don't know if i can, but
i told her i'd try.

you see
the thing is
the problem exists
or the conflict permeates
i don't like to see you in permanent colors
i much prefer the shades
the maybes
the whatevers and the
i don't really know if that happened,
the
i don't know if you really exist.

in my world, here/now
you fall from gravity
disperse into foreign, untouchable lands.
i prefer it that way
after spending years entrenched in your solitude
your whims and disastrous mess
of a world:
a world i still think isn't concrete, isn't
real.

i said goodbye to you
when i told you "enough"
when i realized your lies and exclusions
far outweighed any semblance of truth you could muster.
because i guess that's the catch
your reality isn't real
which defeats the purpose of real-ity anyway.

if you want my truth, i can deliver it:
yes, i loved you.
yes, i believed in us.
yes, i tried to fix you.
yes, i realize, now, how fucking stupid i was.

ownership.
you were never mine.
you could never untangle yourself from the demons,
from the temptations, from the want
of others.
you taught me to self-exist
to not depend
to look at you through eyes clouded with regret.
you taught me
to leave.

what we had was disaster
imprinted with tiny stamps of affection
blistering fragments of love
or something like it.
i don't believe in perfect
and hadn't before you
so this mess you left me with
didn't make me believe
less or more
or at all.

sure, you loved me
in the way that only you could love.
not with your hands or mouth,
not even with your heart,
but with some fractured piece of your mind
that was bloodied and bent.
you wanted to love me.
i get that.
clearly.
and i loved you with most of my heart
except for that piece that was reserved for another.
it was love, okay. i accept.

but that is love
i wouldn't wish on anyone.

i tried to save you
in saving us.
i wanted to breathe life back into you
or make you see the world
the way i wanted to see it.
i wanted you
to be whole
and you couldn't do it.
that's fine -- i accept.
but, just for the record:
you didn't have to drag me through that with you.
i would have been fine,
better,
without it.
without you.

i wish i could write, now,
in this haze of blue moon,
what i loved about you but all i can think of
is your smile.
and how rare it was, so of course
when i actually saw it, in its realness,
i loved it.

i don't hate you, just so you know
but you don't
and i don't care much either way.
you broke these fantasy bones
tempered my optimism
and you made me weak.
but you and i
in our last goodbye
were finite
and i was free.

chris pureka would say
you were a lesson in losing
and lesson in letting go.
i wish i had known that
in june of 2006
or august of 2006 (i was blind then).
the decembers, always the decembers.

you see:
i don't know what was true.
your lies
and exclusions
exemptions
counteract any act of kindness
or love.
with you,
i don't know what was real
so it's easiest to simply say:
nothing
was real.

and yet you rest in me
this dark, troubled muse.
we bounce together
struggle against our mouths
you want to say no
and i keep saying
yes, yes, yes.
yes, breathe,
yes, release.
there is no space for you inside, here.
yes, let go.
yes.

For H.D.

1

trophies of pain I've gathered. whose sorrow

do I shore up, in trifles? the weavings,

paintings, jewels, plants, I bought

with my heart's hope. rocks from the road

to Hell, broke pieces of statuary, ropes,

bricks, from the city of Dis.

encrusted. they surround me: nest

the horror of each act from which I saved

a dried, dismembered hand. poisoned

amulets, empty vials still fuming. their tears

saved longingly as my own. to have

"lived passionately" this secret

hoarding of passion. Truth turned against itself.

by Diane Di Prima

(my bold; my truth)

(give me my life's passion, in whatever form it may be)

(that passion, of course, outside of the love/lust/beauty passion I cultivate every moment with my love)

and then, there was:

what happened to passion

what happened to my desire to do this thing well,

this thing that pays,

that keeps me moving m-f,

that puts me in the direct line of fight

sometimes fire

i end up so exposed

and raw to the bone.

and passion (when outside these walls

wild and full and pure beauty)

is a misnomer

or i just haven't found it

here.

yesterday my girlfriend

(because she is secretly a lawyer)

made me see sides i didn't want to see

or think about

because obviously of course

she asked me questions

i've already asked myself.

i don't have the answers, really

now or ever

but really

i don't remember why i chose this

other than for my love of language

words

stories

hypotheses

theories

long-winded tall-tongued whirl-shake discussion.

i like symbolism, too.

and symbolically my presence here

is death, i think.

i am not fulfilled.

i am not moving forward.

i am entirely stagnant and impatient

save for those brilliant moments

the ones that re-root me

and answer "why?" with "yes."

when i get the urge to escape

wanting to run away

buy a farm

live in a tree

pack my cats (and my girl) and go

it's clear:

i need change.

so i dream of the west coast

of beginnings and continuations

of a slate unmarred by

a reign of unholy terror

sandwiched between attack dogs

and cannons too loose to trust.

i think maybe that is the worst part

that i have nowhere to go, here.

they have taught me to trust no one, not

a one of them.

largely because

they don't appear to trust me.

i have to be professional

in 45 small minutes

i have to buck up

slap a smile on

get my shit together

and be who i am

while being who they want me to be.

in a trickle of honesty

i don't know how i'm going to pull that off

it's too early in the year to cry

over such petty, bullshitty things.

or miscommunications.

or an intended-to-be helpful chat.

i tell my people

to suck it up

and move on.

they don't always listen

and apparently

neither do i.

putting the damage on

Sometimes I read things that I wrote and think

how naive can you be, really?


Incredibly, apparently.
Wow, past, how you slid right in beneath my radar and corrupted me into scenes of love, leaving me, ultimately, with sienna-tinged memories that belie the truth I could never--

then--

see with my eyes open, closed, squinted, or blinded.

Love, & its shades, its forms & malformations: each time, yes, it was love.
But each time was different. I think
the body, the mind/heart
train us to forget the straight-edge fine-line details
and live instead in a smear that shows
feelings existed
but little detail to frame a reference.
This is better than the last
or that was nothing compared to this
I think lies I told myself once upon a handful of years ago.

But:
This (here/now/Her) is incredible love.
Its excitement rivals any other because
there is no doubt, no fear,
no shades of grey.

the hunt: scent

My fingers smell like ginger, a vestige of the inari I just ate even though my stomach is in a State of Civil Unrest because it's an unruly bitch like that.

But -- anyway -- the ginger:

it reminds me of you.

And not because you ate some last night

because you didn't smell like it

but rather

like camping, sticky-sweet burnt sugar,

like air and desire and the utterly unmistakable

scent that is yours, yours alone,

that I want to drown in each time it slips

beneath my nose

trap it, keep it there,

always.

I like you best, us best, love best.

Like the first time I introduced you

to ginger & inari.

Snowstorm, I think, you gave me that look

like, really? You really want me

to eat this?

Or when we tried it at the sushi place

the other week

and you said "it's just like Wegmans."

Or when I got so excited about finding

ginger chews

at Queens

only to discover that they're actually

kind of disgusting and spicy-tangy

to the extreme.

And when I sink

into your skin

be it night, noon, morning,

(anywhere, any-when)

not wanting to come up for air

just melting,

breathing,

it is you

that I love best.

I had to find you / tell you I need you /

...tell you I set you apart. [coldplay]

The only thing I know about where we're going is that we're going there together. & aside from space and waste and life's blind fury-- I know we'll get there.

When, I don't know. Don't really care. Isn't time irrelevant, isn't it lose around its edges?

Don't we move between seams and hems and zippers?

One thread tug, one sheer slice, one empty escape.

I am yours.