A Trans Teen Speaks Out as Queer Artists Share Stories
Prism & Pen Weekly — May 22, 2022
by James Finn
This week’s P&P is packed with perspective, from a trans teen sharing his journey, to an older gay man sharing wisdom and beauty from the 70s, to queer people of all stripes sharing their lives and loves. Check it out!
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— Editor’s Picks —
Gay, Trans, Black, Woman: Voluntary Segregation Heats Up Across U.S.
by James Finn
As the radically conservative US Supreme Court prepares to eviscerate its 50-year-plus tradition of safeguarding human rights, a great migration may already have begun. Queer people and women are fleeing red states, Black people remain segregated and may become more so. What does this mean for the future and how can we stop what’s already starting?
Not a day goes by that I don’t see social media posts from queer people in Florida, Texas, Tennessee, Oklahoma, or Idaho searching for jobs or housing in blue states, or announcing they’re moving. And why not? LGBTQ people are leaving Florida even though Miami has a reputation as … one of our gayborhoods.
A Trans Teenager’s Story of Self-Discovery
by Aris Jace
Aris is a transgender teenager who is not free to simply be. He wants people to hear his personal story, whether or not they agree that he should exist.
It makes me angry when people say to “think about the kids” when they’re talking about LGBT identities. I was just a kid. What about me? No one ever thought about the children who they taught to hate themselves. Were we not kids?
Allegro: Memory of a First Night Out of the Closet
by David Milley
David’s memories of leaving Florida to find freedom in Philly resonate today. His writing is beautiful and polished, and I would suggest a must-read for young people looking to the past for wisdom.
No doubt, we did live fast in the 1970s. That was the decade when LGBTQ folks strode into sunlight, claiming our due. We had those ten years before the evangelicals really figured out how to stuff us away again. Ten years sped by before a virus did the bigots’ work for them.
— Memoir —
Slammed: a Memoir
by John Cormier
John is back in the saddle after a bout with covid, and this week’s gripping storytelling and powerful imagery are worth the wait. I’ve said it before and it bears repeating — this is some of the best writing on Medium.
As I shut the red door behind them I turned and looked at the remaining three quarters still sitting on the counter.
“I’m a drug dealer.”
I said this to myself with continued astonishment. More than a few times I would park the car while Richard would head inside and I would just sit and say out loud, over and over, becoming increasingly maniacal, “I’m a drug dealer.”
A Tale of Two Souls
Alex’s memoir of love and loss during the worst of the AIDS era continues with his lover Loy’s progression into illness, as a compassionate stranger listens with love.
“I am HIV positive too, of course. I have been at least since 1987. But, by genetic disposition, I’m what they call a slow progressor. My T-cells are still in normal range.
So, he’s dying and I’m here as healthy as any old buck except for the time bomb inside ticking down.”
So, We’re HIV+. We Allot No Blame, Allow No Guilt, Just Get on With It
— Fiction Series —
Prairie Death Tales
David Wade Chambers and Court Atchinson as Courtland Wade
Wade and partner bring Dine City, Oklahoma to life in Prairie Death Tales with tight prose and photography. The “Ben Nathan Murder” mystery heats up this week with peeks into a militia and a quirky gay man’s odd money-losing book store.
On this chilly Sunday evening in Spring, ten figures in camouflage fatigues sat talking and drinking around a campfire. Though racially and politically concordant, they represented a motley variety of types unlikely to assemble except perhaps at a gun club or, in gentler times, with their wives at a church picnic.
— Essays and Creative Nonfiction —
Gay Texan Explores the Power of Desire
We inhabit a world of immanent vastness, our fingertips the keys that open its delights. All the screens and devices, those portals of infinite variety, beckon us touch and see and feel the joy of any desire we may have. What forms in the silences of our minds finds connections in the global, temporally unbounded streams of data that never sleep.
I Think I’m a Cis Gay Man, But I’m Open to Suggestions
by Sean Bennett
When people live in a society that does not even entertain the possibility of identities outside a binary, those identities can become so thoroughly and comprehensively repressed that queer people live their entire lives feeling that something is wrong but never knowing why.
Learning How to Use They/Them with My Nonbinary Teen
A few months after learning that my child, who is nonbinary, uses they/them pronouns, I have been meditating on what the process has been like for me to adjust my language after fifteen years (plus the in utero portion) of referring to them with different pronouns.
Is Outing Transgender Students to Unsupportive Parents Christian?
Could outing trans children to unsupportive parents harm them? It certainly could. What’s more important: telling the “truth” or protecting children? What Would Jesus Do? Jesus was kind to children, and had some sharp words for those who would hurt children.
Trump Judge: Christian Public School Teacher Can Out Trans Kids
by James Finn
In an apparent fit of pique, Pamela Ricard, a math teacher at Fort Riley Middle School in Kansas, told her supervisors that if they made her use transgender students’ chosen names in class, she would use those names with parents too, even if the students fear for their safety and have requested privacy. She’s getting her way, arguing “religious liberty.”
Hey, LGBTQ Friends: We Must Show Up For Each Other.
by Lisa B-L
Forty years later, the hateful attacks on the LGBTQ community today come from a new breed of conservatives … I’m triggered. I’m furious that too many people in my life refuse to acknowledge the harm done to real people. The damage inflicted on me and my wife, their kids, or their friends or neighbors.
17-Year-Old British Footballer Comes Out as Gay
With every sports star at the top of their field that comes out and shares their sexuality, the future for LGBTQ+ people looks just a little brighter. Sporting stories of heroism and triumph are gripping for everyone.
A Lesbian Fashion Plate Is Born: My First (Borrowed) Necktie
I wanted to take an art class. I wanted to browse in bookstores as long as I felt like it because I no longer had a girlfriend who insisted on going everywhere together and then complaining because we weren’t doing things she wanted to do. I wanted to buy and wear ties.
Please Just Say Something Nice
by Emma Holiday
Look, I am transgender. Technically everyone hates me but that’s not true. If it was I couldn’t go on. I just need to look a little harder but the world is full of people who don’t hate me and many who like and even love me as me.
Take a moment over the next couple of days and look for the positives.
Moving 1,719 Miles as a Transgender Married Couple is Overwhelming
Moving 1,719 miles would be a challenge for nearly anyone. As two transgender people making this move together, we face some additional challenges.
For one thing, we’re making this move primarily because we’re trans, though we made this decision before I knew I was a trans man.
Heartstopper Touched My Bisexual Heart
When Nick on Heartstopper first takes an online quiz, he gets the result “62% homosexual” and his eyes are full of tears. I get it. The emotions are just too much to not cry at a moment like that. I have never related to a fictional character more than I did Nick at that moment.
There are the Blues and Then … The Transgender Blues
by Emma Holiday
I think of the “blues” as somewhere between sadness and depression, with a healthy sprinkle of loneliness. It is then wrapped up in a cocoon of melancholy. Sometimes, it feels like an emotional baseball bat smacking you in the head.
Transgender Utopia Exists; I Have Seen It First Hand
I don’t pass. I just don’t. I don’t care especially… I am accepted. I golf every Tuesday afternoon with a group of women. I joined the LPGA because it is a requirement of the group. I am so thrilled to be a member of a national women’s organization.
Dysphoria in Excelsis.
I’m a year and a bit on hormones and I’m still a sir, am I? It’s too late to pivot on my heels and leave. I’ve already ordered a pain au chocolat. The sudden calving of my hopes and dreams came free of charge. I won’t be coming here again.
Notorious Anti-LGBTQ Bishop Denies Pelosi Communion Over Abortion
by James Finn
It’s bad enough this guy is a notorious anti-LGBTQ bigot reviled by many San Francisco Catholics. It’s bad enough he’s defying Pope Francis’s directive not to use Church sacraments as weapons. But when he tries to force House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to change how she represents her constituents, he’s gone more than just a bridge too far.
Transgender Representation in ‘A Million Little Things’
The TV series A Million Little Things is a show about a group of friends and family who are basically a chosen family. It is reminiscent of This Is Us and always makes me cry.
— Fiction Finds —
Take It on Faith (15): A Secret Asexual Traitor to Her Country
“Wait, I don’t have my documents, money, or anything — ” I panicked. “And how did you get past security? We’ll get arrested!”
Annoyed, Amalia stopped me and told me to not think so much and that she would explain while we were actually seated.
Don’t Just Wrap Yourself In The Pride Flag — Stand Up And Say Something
by Elle Fredine
So, that’s how we ended up breaking into the school on Saturday afternoon. Arliss’d even lined up some help. I nearly fainted when Susan Abernathy walked in flanked by Rob and Paul, her two older brothers.
Half the girls’ soccer team trailed in behind them, carrying Mr. Olsen’s tallest ladder.
— Poetry Picks —
Those Eyes — a poem
by Jenny Starr✨star
You have beautiful eyes,
And they see
The beauty of broken things.
The Cost of Being Transgender
Because it is my price.
The coin of the realm is cast with my tears.
The debt came due and I paid with this:
my blood, my core, my substance, my relationship with you
That’s it, folks! Hope you find some great stories, and it’s prompt time already tomorrow. Writers? Throw me some ideas?
Seeya next Sunday! ❤
Jim
