Pride Comes Before the Fall

Let's start Pride month with a bang! I wrote this a couple years ago about my frustration and despair over my religious family not accepting me for being queer and trans.

I stole the cover photo from a conservative bigot's post ranting about Pride lol

I stub my toes on your pride

Beat my shins up too

But you think I’m a narcissist

Since I celebrate Pride

And finally love and accept myself

Free from the facade of sin

To you the only good gay

Is one who is ashamed

And trying in vain to change

Because it’s a sin to switch

Genders and names

Unless it’s for a biblical reason

You approve of…

Like yours

I asked you in a panic so many times

What you thought of gay people

Confused and ashamed by my thoughts

You told me that you might 

Come to my hypothetical gay wedding

But not to the ceremony

While you suffer a moral dilemma

Because you don't want to condone

That perversion

Too blinded by prejudice

To celebrate your child’s love

But of course

You were speaking of

The fictional gay male predators

That implant queerness in innocent kids

The imaginary gross lesbians

That only exist in porn for male pleasure

People that your children

Would never grow up to be

Each time you answered

With rejection and eternal damnation

A part of me perished

While gazing in your stern eyes

Queerness oozed out of mine

I was in front of you the whole time

And you still didn’t see me

Couldn’t…refused to

Still can’t

Everyone knows trans people

Aren’t gifted the grace of God

Not worthy of being in his presence

Unless we commit sacrificial suicide

Die to self and leave our authenticity

At the door

My kind certainly don’t get an invitation

To the most elite celestial party

We get bounced from the pearly gates

We’re supposed to go

Back down that way

Pride comes before the fall

That fatal sin

And I fell from your grace

As if I vanished from your life

Without a trace

I tried to double back

But you set impossible traps

I couldn’t keep jumping

Through your moral hoops

Countless times I’ve put on a brave face

Then fell apart on the bathroom floor

While you put on a convincing show

For your adoring audience

Your malice playing a disappearing trick

Right after tearing me to shreds

And leaving me to sweep up the pieces

When all of you kicked dust at me

I guess I wasn’t blessed

With the ability to

Conform to society

I’m sorry I couldn’t conform to our family

I tried…but I’m tired

Pride comes before the fall

And I welcome the descent

With open arms

I’ll go be with the other degenerates

Anything would be better

Than eternity by your side

Never meeting my gaze fully

Ever

Reminding me I’m a sinner

Forever