Welcome back, our poem this week is from the Professor of Whimsy himself - Robert Garnham!
--
To the car full of girls who shouted 'Poof!' at me as they drove past

Of course it might have been a lucky guess.
Though I held high in the Scottish drizzle
A RAINBOW UNICORN UMBRELLA
Which even I concede was a little camp.
Or maybe my pink feather boa was
Poking out from my Tesco's bag for life.
Or maybe they were just nasty bastards.

It wasn't like I was gawping at a fit bloke,
Or wearing my I Like Cock tshirt,
Or logging into Grindr and shouting,
Where are you, FunkyLoveMuffin,
Cooooooeeeeee!
I was on the way to buy a steak and Kidney pie
And you can't get any straighter than that.

As the car sped away
I felt the loving embrace of the generations who couldn't.
But did anyway.
Souls whose crime was to love
But loved fiercely and with passion.
This thought, and my RAINBOW UNICORN UMBRELLA
Added some glitz to a drizzly Tuesday morning.

What was it that gave the game away?
Did I flounce did I strut did I sashay
Did I mince,
Does it matter?
No glitter in the drizzle no secret street sequins
I've been out and proud
Since before you were born,
Gayer than the gayest gay that ever did gay,
Though I do occasionally wear an anorak.

Like phantoms they come, Alan Turing,
Oscar Wilde, Freddie Mercury, Frank O'Hara,
Marcel Proust, Noel Cowerd, Quentin Crisp,
Their ghosts swirling along the Edinburgh cobbles,
Bert and Ernie from Sesame Street,
And the anonymous lovers of old
Proudly flying the flag before it even existed,
Beating down the fear and marching brave,
Stonewall freedom fighters, Harvey Milk, a fist raised
Triumphant in the oneness of a gay new world
That those for whom biology had different ideas
Might walk unmolested in the conscience
Of public acceptance.

And I, oh,
I might rise before you!
You will cower and tremble,
I, mighty gay overlord,
Will crush thy Fiat Panda betwixt my
Powerful thighs
For it is I, prince of rainbows,
Puncher of preconceptions,
The Pink Avenger,
Exacting my just and fearful revenge
In the name of blessed queerdom!

But then,
I just sigh,
And I say to myself,
Some people
Are just tossers.
--

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Rachel Rose Reid

Burning Eye PodcastBy Burning Eye BooksDec 01, 2021