It’s gay / That’s gay / You’re gay / Reyt gay
Gay boy / Gay lord
Bum boy / Batty boy
Bender
Queer
It’s all any of them ever
Wanted to talk about:
Fantasies of me
Licking balls / Sucking dick / Groping biceps
Snogging men / Getting bummed
Why?
It never occurred to me
To ask why
I became obsessed
With it too:
It’s gay / That’s gay / You’re gay / Reyt gay
Gay boy / Gay lord
Bum boy / Batty boy
Bender
Queer
It wasn’t something I ever
Dared to bring up,
Not until now
Because now
I know I’m not
The only one
That’s gay / Quite gay
Kind of gay / Bi actually
Gay boy / Gay lord
Bum boy / Batty boy
Bender
Queer
And I’m sure some of
You are too
After wasting so much
Of your breath
Convincing us you weren’t
And now those of you who aren’t
Any of those things
Never want to talk about it again,
Never want to think about it again,
Never want to look us in the eye
And see how proud we’ve become
Why?
What exactly is wrong with
Being gay / Reyt gay
A gay boy / Gay lord
Bum boy / Batty boy
Bender
Queer?
It’s occurred to me now
To ask why
©Paul Whelan, 2022
This poem was longlisted as part of the Spectrum: Poetry Celebrating Identity project. Click here to find out more about the project, and other poems on the longlist here.
Spectrum
The concept of identity – be it class, gender, sexuality, national, institutional, or anything else we define ourselves by – has gone through radical change over the past half-century, and the idea of definition by binary oppositions is no longer as relevant as it once was.
Spectrum is a poetry anthology that seeks to amplify marginalised voices, and to celebrate the great diversity and rich variation in the identities of people from around the world and from a huge cross-section of walks of life.
Click here for the anthology of shortlisted poems.