Work Text:
a vent
- when you’ve never heard the term “glass closet”
- and you’re thirteen years old at a sleepover
- you don’t know that your love sits at odds with this world
- but you know kathy looks nice with her hair pulled back
- and you hope nobody noticed you staring
- the first thing you learn about feminism
- when you’re fifteen years old on tumblr
- is that the media obsesses over beauty
- and that objectifying pretty girls is wrong
- but kathy still looks nice with her hair cut short
- and now you really hope nobody sees you looking
- because you glanced around the room to check and no one else is
- so your stares must make you sexist or a creep
- and when you discover demi, ariana, chappell
- and pass your nights watching their videos online
- you know better than to sexualize them
- to scrutinize their relationships
- to show deeper interest in them at all
- because you’re terrified of being called a creep
- and you’re trying your damnedest not to be one
- so you wrangle back your attention
- and cast it onto a man
- you can look at him because you’re expected to
- and hell, it’s not that bad
- his content’s actually relatable
- maybe that's why you noticed him at all
- but when you notice that man lives in a glass closet
- when he looks at shayne the way you look at kathy
- when you catch him glance around the room to see if anyone else is looking
- you catch the way he looks away when no one is
- suddenly his gaze becomes the target of your interest
- i understand
- what you feel isn’t a fetish
- you aren’t drawn to the ~sexy male gayness~ of it all
- you just recognize that glass closet
- and it’s a closet you can look at without feeling like a creep
- it feels like company, like warmth, like love
- to take that young queer girl and tell her to stop looking
- again
- because how dare she seek community outside the circle you’ve drawn around her
- because how dare she identify with someone who isn’t a woman
- because how dare she feel her closet means she has more in common with this man
- (this man that, yes, she doesn't know)
- than she does with kathy or anyone else in her real life
- to tell her to look away from everyone because her gaze makes you uncomfortable
- that
- does damage you will never understand
a prayer
it takes courage to be who you are
queer love is a candle burning bright inside you
queer gender lights you up from within
and i know some days you have to hide it
tuck it deep within yourself
to pass through the shadows of this world in peace
and when you catch a glimpse of someone
with a candle of their own
deeply shrouded
tucked where no one else can see
when you recognize that flicker
and you know it as your own
that takes courage
to say, “i have this light”
“and others do too”
“and i see it”
“and i’ll say it”
“a million times”
“until we’re free to shine as bright as we deserve”
"until not one of us snuffs out our light again"
it takes courage
it creates love
it creates light
shine on.