“PROLOGUE”
{1992}
Punk.
Quite possibly, there is no other word in Black American vernacular that
continues to work me like this
word.
Nigger pales in comparison!
Even the most casual use of the word triggers that dreaded stab in the pit
of my gut that permeates my entire being. And let's face it; you haven't been called a punk until a black man calls you a punk!
I had, no have, the exceptionally
asinine notion, that if I am able to write it, and look at it, and write it,
and look at it, it doesn't hurt as much.
I am wrong!
Sissy is bad enough but, strangely enough, unlike punk, usually does not
strongly suggest that as the lowest form of civilization, violent and permanent
expulsion from decent society is imperative.
Sissy, very slightly, acknowledges tolerance but at the exorbitant price
of relinquishing one's dignity.
What
on earth could I be suggesting?! Sissies
and dignity are contradictions in terms!
Bullshit!
I
think punk is to the black homosexual what boy is to the black man. Both misnomers are unnecessarily dehumanizing
as well as emotionally debilitating.
Faggot and queer were not so widely used and consequently don't elicit
as strong a response.
For
the longest time, I believed that the sincerest (and only) mode of expression
for me was singing, totally discounting my affinity for writing and my love of
literature. However, cigarettes, coupled
with countless personal diversions (all of which are now grist for the literary
mill) blew that all to hell!
Once
upon a time, I entered a short story contest sponsored by Ebony Magazine. The losing story, included here,
"Anatomy of a Graduation" was actually a variation on a story I wrote
in college for the publication for Black
Week, a very popular event among black students on white campuses in the
seventies. Since the contest, I haven't
been able to stop.
While
writing is quite fulfilling, it is also most difficult. Even shrouding actualities amid fiction
doesn't seem to ease some of the more sensitive areas because I end up reliving
those same fantasies and pains and triumphs and failures all over again. I am
surprised at how fresh they are after all these years.
I
remember how we would laugh like hell at Robette, a
very dear cousin to whom this first effort is dedicated, who would sit in her
favorite chair in Mama's living room engulfed in millions of sheets of notebook
paper, all of which she had written something
on, clearly indicating, at least to me, that she had a statement to make.
Girlfriend
thought nothing of casting her pearls before swine and anxiously offered her
work to even the most casual reader. The
most endearing thing about her was that she appeared amazingly oblivious to the
possibility that a potential reader would dislike what she had written. Even more remarkable was that she remained
undaunted; the more we laughed, Robette included, the
more determined she became. She is now a
remarkable woman who has been encouraging me for years to start writing and
whose friendship as well as kinship is indeed precious to me.
No one
should be totally defined by any one aspect of his or her life. The only
difference between heterosexuality and homosexuality is sexual behavior, which
should be strictly a private matter.
What else could there possibly be about me that separates me from the
masses? A basic human need is to belong in spite of rather than because of individual differences. However, a very sad universal constant is
that the simplest desires in life are exasperatingly difficult to fulfill.
I'd like
to think that the catalyst for my re-awakened literary interest was a burning
desire to take my place among such inspirations as James Baldwin, Toni
Morrison, Alice Walker, Langston Hughes, Richard Wright, Tennessee
Writing
has always been the only way I could ever get to the heart of the matter. Furthermore, there are some people I
desperately need to address.
I
would first and foremost like to shake my parents until they could truly
believe that my homosexuality does not (and more to the point should not) suggest a serious flaw in my
upbringing. I am keenly aware that this
is difficult for parents to accept and in the case of mine, doubly. I have never expected them to accept in a few
minutes something I have to deal with on some level every day. I will always, however, expect them to at
least try because I am their child.
But
even as of this writing, I feel, somewhat estranged from my mother because I
sent a manuscript of "First Love," included here and a story of which
I am quite proud, to her to read and for months I didn't hear a word from her. When I finally did talk to her again,
circumstances forced me to reveal that I had tested positive for AIDS. She took it much better than I had
anticipated but requested that she be the one to tell my father. (This
later proved to be a serious mistake.)
I honestly don't expect the strain to last forever, but I cannot shake the
sinking feeling that the only way the ever-present discomfort between my
parents and myself will be truly dissipated will be
upon my death. I honestly do believe my
father is trying and my mother is coping.
But that is exactly the point! Their whole the-less-I-know-the-better
attitude is simply too stifling an atmosphere to foster an honest
relationship. Moreover, no matter how
much I love them, there is an underlying resentment
for all this effort it apparently takes for them to have to deal with their own
child.
I have
always been family-oriented but realized that because of who slash what I was,
I would have to get over that in a big way.
My having tested positive for AIDS has heightened that awareness, if
that is possible. I only want to bridge
some gaps before it is too late and will never
accept the fact that this may very well be an impossibility.
(It has been months later and
exactly as I predicted, the strain is truly dissolving and it appears my
parents and I are becoming closer. We
have made remarkable strides and though the catalyst for this progress has been
dire emotional upheavals on both sides, I remain Machiavellian by acknowledging
that the end justifies the means)
I must
admit, though, that we still have a ways to go.
It is one thing to become aware of AIDS via the media and live in an
area where AIDS education is sadly inhibited simply because the prevailing
regional attitude is reflected through such a profoundly annoying asshole like
Senator Jesse Helms. Compound that with
the fact that two of your own sons are dying from a disease that many doctors
are refusing to even treat for fear of losing other patients and you get an
inkling of my mother's mental state. She
maintains that she has never seen anyone with AIDS and she just can't handle it
in her own children. I am honestly
trying to give her the benefit of the doubt; that is easier said than done.
I'm
sure Mama is ultimately ashamed of what we have contracted. She is probably too preoccupied with how we got the disease
instead of simply dealing with the fact that we have it. She doesn't want certain people to know. At this point, neither my brother nor I give
a fat baby's ass who knows! She insists
she would rather come to
Well,
my God, she could have fooled me!
She
would be forced to confront our lifestyles and
for THAT, she's not ready. My
brother and I came all the way across country to live to avoid an almost
certain life of undue suppression and to spare our family unnecessary
notoriety. Unless there are remarkable
and expedient medical advances, death hovers uncomfortably close. We only want to be home once more before that
happens.
`Alas,
we make two steps forward and five backward.
While I realize that this is the norm in the evolution of relationships,
this does take its toll on those involved.
Perhaps my previous statement regarding bridging gaps before it is too
late is disconcertingly accurate. I certainly
hope not.
Secondly,
there are countless young black children growing up who are horribly confused
about their sexual identities and I'm afraid in many cases their families or
their communities are incapable of understanding or simply refuse to acknowledge
these situations. I am hardly suggesting
that other ethnic families/communities do not have the same problems or handle
them any better or worse than the black community. This is simply my point of reference.
Many
black men like myself have been sadly represented and
misrepresented via the media. Even when
the subject was broached, it reeked of either pathos or ridicule. These caricatures of the black homosexual weren't
considered detrimental by their respective producers. (Hell, you were already a
punk - how much worse could it possibly get?!) However, these presentations
didn't exactly help matters either. To
date, among the best treatments of black homosexuality have been two
anthologies, In the Life and
Brother to Brother edited by Joseph Beam and
Essex Hemphill respectively and the film "Tongues Untied" produced
and directed by Marlon Riggs. On the
other hand, one of the most controversial depictions was the presentation of
characters, Antoine and Blaine on Keenan Ivory Wayans' TV production of "In Living
Color."
One
cannot overlook one glaring benefit. At
least gay black men, especially those of us with an inclination toward literary
expression, can now thoroughly clarify ourselves in whatever fashion we deem
necessary. Far too long we have had to
be either abjectly outrageous or abjectly discreet in order to survive. Whether society is ready for any form of
black gay expression ceases to be a consideration.
Make
no mistake about it. I am not deluding
myself. Perhaps I can only speak with
qualification about myself. But as much
as I love living in
Everyone
has a story to tell and if given half a chance, can write it as well. I sincerely believe that there are as many
legitimate writing styles as there are readers.
While I have been influenced by established literary figures, and I use
the term quite loosely, I no longer feel doomed to copy any of their styles. I am aware that these influences merely
represent a standard from which to work and it is imperative that is kept in
mind.
On a
much more fundamental level, it is most exhilarating to ignore grammatical
conventions that were established with absolutely no regard whatsoever for the
various dialects prevalent in American society.
Moreover, there have been no grammatical adjustments either to reflect
the cultural diversity of this country.
If you claim to miss my point because I refuse to adhere to certain
grammatical standards, I would eagerly offer you my ass to kiss while you,
mouth agape, would regard me as rude, crude, and socially unacceptable.
As a
former English teacher, I taught many students whose grammar was quite
unconventional, even from my own, and who had also been taught that their
manner of expression was wrong as
opposed to different. This continues to be a seriously damaging
judgment call for it implies that if the manner of expression is wrong/inferior
then so are the thinking processes and nothing could be further from the truth. Besides, we all know how dangerous it is to
fuck with the thinking process.
For
the sake of a possible publisher, however, I would just love to make some
"
My
primary objective is quite simple. I
genuinely hope to help other "punks" in their struggle for survival
and to strike an empathetic chord in those who didn't think us worthy of any
positive considerations in the first place.
Since
my last addition to this essay, my brother, Sammi,
has become seriously ill with AIDS and living in a hospice. From the looks of things, he won't be around
much longer. (I seriously hope not.) At
the same time his ex-lover and my best friend, Kevin, is languishing from the
disease in a hospital. I am not
well at all! I think I'm doing okay
under the circumstances. I also am
stupid enough to think that I am prepared for the death of my little brother
and my best friend which threatens (promises?) to happen around the same time.
Daddy
came out to see Sammi and be with me and the time
spent was so precious and uplifting and positive I simply will never forget it
for as long as I live.
It has
been three weeks later.
On
September 14, 1992, my best friend Kevin, died after a
harrowing three-year struggle with AIDS.
He was determined however, to see that Sammi
was taken care of before he surrendered.
The Sunday before Labor Day, Kevin insisted on a pass from the hospital
to see Sammi in the hospice. Kevin himself was emaciated and weak from
chemotherapy treatments he had been receiving.
The hospice Sammi stayed in was a beautiful
Victorian flat with many stairs – at this point Kevin HIMSELF was too weak to
walk. His father LOVINGLY carried him up
all those steps, he hobbled over to Sammi who could
barely sit up, and I could not stop crying as he tried with all his damn might
to give my brother his medication. Yeah, this one worked me….
On
September 22, 1992, Sammi died peacefully at the
hospice.
I
cannot begin to explain my hurt, my horror, my frustration, my hopelessness, my
despair, and my profound rage at a government who manufactures a disease and
then simply refuses to provide even a modicum
of relief much less a cure! Forgive my
cynicism but weren't these the same motherfuckers who intentionally injected
several black men in Tuskegee, Alabama with syphilis, told them it was
something else, and REFUSED TO TREAT THEM!
Why is it so far-fetched to believe they could apply the same principal
on a much larger scale especially with technology being what it is today?!
What works
me so is that the medical and scientific communities would have us believe
after all this time that the sexual exchange of bodily fluids and the use of
intravenous drugs are the major contributors to this disease. My biggest question is why the fuck did this
show up in the latter half of the 20th century?! People have been having unprotected sex for
CENTURIES with the worst case scenario being intense cases of venereal disease
that would surely lead to death but nothing
like this brush fire! It just strikes me
odd as hell that a synthetic disease has no remedy!
Simply
stated, many of my friends have already been murdered! My brother was murdered! My best friend was murdered and I am being
murdered! To add salt to the wounds, the
majority of people in this country just don't give a flying fuck! Hello!
People! This simply has to stop!
(!!GOD, that felt good)!!
COPYRIGHT
NOTICE: Jackie D. Gray, 1993, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED