Milk, please.

“If a bullet should enter my brain, let it open every closet door.” –Harvey Milk

I love a woman who loves women
and she loves me.
And, Harvey, we love you.

You changed me, Harvey.
When that bullet grazed your hand,
it splintered my closet door.
As a death notice lodged in your brain,
my door flung open wide and I blinked into the sun
Of the vast
unrelenting
unforgiving
unloving
world.
And I smiled.

Harvey, I am so sorry about Jack,
but he wasn’t your fault.
And Scotty always loved you.
Can you love a woman
who loves women?
I hope so.
I will always love you
for what you did, what you lost,
how you made them all believe.

How you made me believe
that I’m not a disease.
I’m a woman
who loves women,

And I am beautiful.

The best recipe for sweet tea? Skoal.

I must admit, I do wonder why people are so willfully ignorant. What about a person makes them inhuman? What makes a freak? Sadly, most of the people I have met have a set idea in their minds of what a freak does and does not consist of. It's the human condition, I believe, and a very simple one. Human beings fear what they do not understand. Humans also destroy what they fear. So, what happens to the supposed "freaks" in this fearful society? It seems that attempts are constantly being made to destroy us. Destruction is a tricky and decieving little bugger, though. It can come in so many subtle forms: a look that is just a little too lingering, a snicker as you walk past, a spit of Skoal in a McDonald's sweet tea, even silence. Yes, silence is destruction when it comes to us "freaks" of the world. If we stay silent, we simply become another ignored part of their world. I find it immeasurably sad that I have to use the terms "us" and "them", but it's the way of society these days. "Welcome to the gun show, kids. Fall into line immediately. You are a boy (left). You are a girl (right). You, you creature, are a freak." A binary gender system is the only known and "correct" gender system these days. Well, to the ignorant little boy who works at McDonald's, I have something to tell you. I am a person. "We" are people. I sincerely hope that you can learn that someday.

What the hell is genderqueer?

My friends joke about this picture and say, "Look, it's Cori and her twin brother." They're kind of right. I won't bore you with the confusing details of my childhood, but I feel I must say that I have always felt pressured to act as either a boy or a girl, and I have never fully been either. Yes, my birth certificate says that I am a girl. Yes, I was raised as a girl. Yes, I consider myself a lesbian for lack of a better word. But, recently, I have decided to become a person without gender. How is this done? I suppose we'll find out together. The term I have heard for my decision is "genderqueer." What a wonderful way to start a stereotype! My friends, though many are homosexual, mostly think that this is a very strange decision. I do not. Growing up, I never did the things girls did. I have always been more of a tomboy. However, though trying in vain to force myself into both male and female gender roles, I never felt like I was a boy either. So what am I? Maybe I'll be a person.