Coming to Reading....

The first book I ever fully read was the Bible. I am the son of a preacher who shunned all things secular, so our world growing up was filtered through the rigid lens of a circumscribed Christianity. I must have been born a rebel, or became one quite early. Having what seems an early sense of awareness about all things that were wrong with the world-- my family's poverty, racism, my father's righteous patriarchy, and even my sense that who I might choose to love as an adult would deem me a moral criminal-seemed to color the lens through which I read this book that was the meat and potatoes of conversation 7 days a week. I hated this book as much as I loathed my given name. I stuttered on m's and eventually renamed myself. The name Timothy never felt welcome in my mouth; it referenced some biblical apostle who honored the God who hated me, so I got over the speech impediment but changed my name. This practice of deconstructing language to create new language was as much about seeing world beyond the one described at church and family discussions about sinners.

I was a child who loved finding the contradiction in things, because my reality seemed so contradictory. A loving God would not have me and so many others live in such destitution and shame-so this awareness was the foundation for my penchant for literary criticism. I learned to love to read to dismantle and deconstruct. I longed to find the words between the lines, the items that may have been edited out, whatever the author didn't want me to know. I wanted a deeper understanding than the books provided where the fairy tale ended and there was no complexity beyond the joyous redemption of some tragic hero, be it Jesus or Job, Cinderella or Snow White. So I hated most books for whatever ideas I felt they left out.

I don't know what it was about the book “Grendel”, this attempt at giving voice to this creature slain by the mighty Beowolf, but it was among the first book that captured my attention. I wanted to know the story behind the big bad wolf, behind with evil witches, behind Lucifer-wanted them humanized and themselves worthy of redemption, forgiveness, a good life. “Grendel” offered the other story-attempted to give voice to the unnamable, the invisible, the abject, and so I identified with its complex attempt at creating empathy for the “villain”. I wrote my first poetry after reading this book as a young teen. I knew that there must have been other stories that people were writing that were on somebody's “banned” list. Those are the books I wanted to read. Those were the books I wanted to write. I've learned that most of the banned books are, interestingly, also the great books.

I no longer believe that I'm hellbound or that God hates me; though I am not Christian either. It's not my intention to connect my love for literacy to this more painful struggle towards self-acceptance, but it is relevant. When I got to college, I sought out the opinions and ideas that I had been sheltered from for my own “supposed” protection that left me without a lens to clearly see myself-see myself as beautiful, worthy of a good life, capable of being somebody else's hero or “savior”. I am now able to translate this penchant for literary criticism into any and everything I read; so this loathing for force-fed literature (be in the bible, or the canonical works of high school English) enabled me to see all literature as something that would tell a story beyond its actual words, beyond the intention of the author. Reading became a tool for moving hidden, scorned, abject things to spaces of visibility.

As an English teacher, I am often concerned about how to make literature “relevant” to students who often don't see what they are reading as “relevant”. There's a nugget there for everyone, and the task of the good teacher is to help the student get in touch with whatever is said, unsaid, or needs to be said that can transform their world-view. It's kind of like reading the bible these days, without the criminalizing subtext of fire and brimstone, but empowered to look critically at even a biblical apostle like Timothy, and imagine him a beautiful, fallible, stuttering human-trying desperately, like most of us, to find the roadmap to his heaven. Books prior to the “Grendel” moment were essentially the monstrous impositions of the world as other people wanted me to see it-with multiple choice answers about which characters did what when. Boring…. I want the good scandalous stuff; the debate, the devils advocate, the controversy-not so much for the sake of argument, but because somebody somewhere might find themselves in that brave space to speak against what is accepted as normative; and write a new book: a “color purple”, a “giovanni's room”, a “native sun”, a “history or sexuality”, or a “coming to writing”.

How someone's interpretation of a monster thinking, talking, having feeling, could awaken such feelings and a love for literature is perhaps still a bit of an enigma to me. I don't even remember Grendel's author or many of its finite details. But there are lots of other authors, who I may have never found had I not found “Grendel”. No, I am not a monster. Maybe I am just an author seduced by some teacher many moons ago to read this “Grendel” book. Maybe I'm a teacher who will guide some kid who is hiding from themselves, the impetus to be okay with whatever reality they live with, and locate the larger communities of hope waiting for their story to be told.

Shut UP!

(for eric)

Shut up!
you are wrong about me, nigga!
i don't always say what I feel
sometimes i swallow the words
before they erupt
and the gush flows like lava
sometimes I break the synaptic connection
between my heart and brain
so despite what you think
I don't always say what I feel
nigga!

but I do feel
and I do feel you
so intensely i wish it didn't feel
so full
and sometimes
even when i try to snatch words
out of the air
before they fall on your ears
or sing (a joyful song)
and joke (to mask these tears of joy)
or listen (cuz even our silence is music)
i know I need to hold up
back back
let you build the confidence in me
I have in myself

but sometimes I need you to
Shut Up!
cuz you be wrong about me, nigga!
sometimes
the words come involuntary
like hick-up or ka-choo
they get beyond my intention
to enslave them to my fear
that you will fear this
assurance I'm feeling
this cocky, Shaft-like, Superman
"I gots you, BABY
.....I handles mine!"

so Shut Up!
for as sure as I need to sing
i would never do anything
but want happiness for you
even if it wasn't with me, baby.
so I know you need time
to pace
and be cautious
be silly-fabulous
so that you don't do
what I'm failing so horribly
at doing:
stopping myself from expressing
how much
I adore you.

yes, dear
before you tell me to shut up, nigga?
Shut Up!

The Families we choose, The Family we don't.

i recently found out from my pops that my aunt keeps stirring up my moms emotions by reminding her that I'm going to hell, if they don't get me to convert back to womyn. In all honestly, I'm too old and tired of this (came out at 17, I'm 33). My mom, being the "good Christian" woman she is, loves her son, so wouldn't say a word about this to me.... My mom asked my dad if he could help me change... to which my dad responded... "you have a perfect son who is the way god meant him to be". my father is a minister.

I don't know that I can deal with this familial pity. (interestingly, it only comes from the women in my family. My pops and brothers are, surprisingly, cool as icebergs (we talk about my current relationship, they ask questions, they offer support, they insist on building a relationship with guys I develop a serious interest in... we can all hang out. it's cool.

but the womyn... they're only cool when I'm single and unattached. I guess, in their minds, I'm not "sinning" if it's not active. They've gone as far as to ask me not to come home if with my partner (in the past); and the one time I did, several of the womyn wouldn't shake his hand... one dashed the home with holy water (or something) after. As ridiculous as this may seem to some, ITS INCREDIBLY HURTFUL to experience.

there just comes a point when its not okay to agree to disagree... in particular, when the very fabric of who you are and how you envision your life (with a partner, potentially children, etc...) is seen as an inherent, irreversable, embarrasing flaw/demon/abberation. How am I "shaming" my family because I choose to live honestly? And we wonder why people are DL... If I could do it again, sometimes I wonder.

we've had the conversations before... but I'm just tired of being tired of it now. I want to maintain a realtionship with them, but if they refuse to know who I am, fully, then what's the use? I'm not the 17 year old who left home for college 16 years ago.

Most recently, word got back to me that I was "shaming" the family because of how open I have been in my writing and music about my sexuality, my HIV status, etc...

Just yesterday in NC, I had a great time with my siblings..... and when I'm with the family, we can sing and act a fool and all is cool. But there's a very painful, hurtful gap there... I want more with my family than nostalgic memories. I want a relationship, in particular with the women in my family, where we can deal honestly with my PRESENT. I'm not saying they gotta like it.... I just want them to stop praying and wishing for me to change. It essentially feels like them sayin... "we love everything about you, except (him/that)..." 6 years ago I was given a year if I didn't get on supermeds for HIV. I decided then that to continue to supress me, for peace sake, was no kind of peace at all.

and the love the sinner (and who ain't?) hate the sin (which is?)....

it just don't work for me anymore. My father is a minister in Richmond, VA. who believes in a compassionate, loving ministry that accepts everyone unconditionally. He gets ridiculed for it, but i think it's a way he honors his struggles to see me as the same good black man he raised, even though I aspire a life partnership with a guy.

maybe I'm just asking for a little encouragement. Should I explain to my mother how this makes me feel? I think my one particular womyn in my family is a lesbian who has sacrificed her "life" to live a "good Christian" life... and expects everyone else to. She's vehement and unrelenting about this. I was hospitalized for depression in 2001 after a series of "this is what hell looks like" pamphelts sent me over the edge (and this after a breakup). I don't disrespect her decision to deal with it the way she choses, but to expect the same from me.... and to constantly keep stuff going with family who are struggling to try to accept and love me.... it's really awful.

if i didn't love these women, it wouldn't matter.... but i do.

forgive the rant.