Coming Out--a poem

 With the assistance of Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, T.S. Eliot, Sylvia Plath, Ana Castillo, William Carlos Williams, Gary Soto, Andrew Marvell, and Langston Hughes

I celebrate myself, and sing myself.

I wish! Actually, I don’t though I know every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I think instead, I’m nobody, without the comforting how dreary – to be – somebody.

In short, I was afraid. I have always been scared of you and have convinced myself

These are not thoughts great books have withstood time for.

But how should I begin to spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways that so much depends on?

Do I dare disturb the universe and declare desire?

I want to jog into the next century on the power of a great, silly grin, roll all my strength and all my sweetness up into one ball, and believe they’ll see how beautiful I am and be ashamed –

Because there is that in me – I do not know what it is – but I know it is in me,

Something inherent that resists the insistence that I don’t exist.