#ans sometimes I fantasize that other people have similar thoughts and maybe this would be helpfu

[yongjae37]

[Poem] On Queerness and all that follows

I thought. Coming out the closet meant I had to do it only once. I thought it would end at acceptance but queerness grows on you the way the fat grows around your waist.

I hide it in formless t shirts and oversized jackets with pockets stuffed with 500 things. In sketchers sneakers that I’ve worn since middle school and In large thick jeans that hide the size of my thighs.

It doesn’t matter, really, whether my friends know or not. Or if my friends care or not. There’s a voice that judges and scrutinizes and nags how I really should’ve washed my face that night. and I wonder. Is love something I really want inside?

It’s something that most days I can’t find myself to care. Or remember or know. I’m too busy being worried about my grades, my sleep, my work. But it whispers sometimes. Would they still like me, if I don’t wear a t shirt in size small? That my shoes give me a two inch boost or that I pick my ears all the time?

I know a few of my friends are queer. I never ask. I never dare. I’m afraid they won’t talk to me. Or act weird around me. And I’m afraid because I only really fall for friends. And I feel safe in thinking they’ll never love me back.

Sometimes I feel lucky as a girl. We get a few people over, we do some night with food and quiet chatter. I had a crush on the one of the girls In her group. I had lent her my phone and made her tea when she got locked out.

But in that idle girls night chatter, we talk about people we like. She mentions this hot guy over seas and the others gossip. I think straight very straight and melt in my pettiness.

I know two of my friends are bi. I think. They like guys and girls. I think. But they never bother telling me who they’re crushing on. Or who looks hot. And I feel disconnected. I know it’s cause I don’t click they way they do. And I’m distant and quiet. I keep things to myself.

My best friend and I used to talk about how hot Keira knightly was. Or this cute girl or guy we saw that day. But we’re distant now. She’s off in Ithaca and I’m just in nyc. I barely send off more than a hi. And she responds with no more than a hello. I love her. I know. She loves me. I know. But I feel hollow and shallow. A puppet on strings.

I’ve come out to my parents 3 maybe 4 times. And I feel like I don’t care. No matter what I do. They will still not love the full me. I don’t tell them I make gay fan art. Or show them much of what I make. They won’t understand I tell myself.

My dad says he still loves me, even tho I’m “bi” (really pan and gray but there’s no word for those in chinese so baby steps I guess.) He wants me to find a husband. So he can feel secure in my future. And I feel. Weird. Inside.

When I meet new people. I never know what to say. Do I come off the bat and say HEY NEW PERSON IM GAY IM ASIAN AND HONESTLY NOT POPULAR BUT OKAY. Isn’t that lame? Do I test the waters, ask about gay rights and pronouns and outrageous bathroom laws. Or do I just. Not care.

Shouldn’t queer be as natural as the black hair on my head and the pimples on my nose. But it’s different. I don’t have to announce to the world I have black hair. It’s. Just. There. Whether I like it or not.

I’ve thought of going to lgbt clubs and gay events. Of meeting other people who were out and about queer. But I don’t have that same passion in my bones. I, just want to be me. I don’t think I care as much as they do. I fear being not gay enough. And that’s sad. Really.

Do I tell my therapists I’m queer? Do I say make gay art and read gay porn? Do I say I love sketching bondage art? Does that make me a fetishist? Am I fetishizing gay people? Can I do that as a queer person? I’m just projecting on to 2D people I... I don’t know.

I like spending my nights alone. Hugging giant plushies close to my chest and lburied in thick layers of blanket. I like being in a space in which I know I’m okay with who I am. And that’s a room with just me.

Online is weird. There’s a weird murky elephant in the room In which everyone is shrodingers queer. Some sort of HONESTLY REALLY FUCKING GAY and lmdao fuck gender constructs. It almost feels like you have to come out as straight. I feel like I can hide behind that curtain of, OF COURSE WE’RE ALL GAy. We’re from the Internet.

It’s freeing. Fun. I feel like maybe I’m actually being myself. But it feels like an illusion I’m seeing inside the Erised mirror and a dream I’ll waking up from all too soon. It’s not really real a voice whispers. And even as I fall for maybe someone I met online. It’s not really real my mind says. It’s all Just blinking pixels sliding across your screen.

I’m proud of myself the same way I love the softness of my belly and the awkwardness of my limbs. I’m proud of my queerness in the same way I sing obscenely off key lyrics to 1D songs and make nonsensical jabbing motions that I call dancing. Quietly, on my own, and in my room.

Coming out happens over and over again. It happens first with myself and then to the world. It happens when I look in the mirror and stare blankly, wondering if I should bother washing my face or if I could get away with just mouth wash.

It happens when I walk out the door and stare at the disappointingly not blue sky and ugly slushee mixes of sun baked snow and salt and dirt.

It happens in those moments I forget that breathing is supposed to be unconscious and when sleeping becomes horribly difficult. It happens over and over and

It never goes away.