Thursday, May 10, 2012

An Old Ode Old to You who Want to Know


This is an old ode old to YOU who want to know or who imply
That I am gay because YOU see on my Facebook page
A post in favor of my gay brothers and sisters

Because YOU can’t bring yourself to believe that a heterosexual black Christian preacher girl
Would take such a stand unless she was something you could despise
Or unless YOU in your mind could make her Other than YOU
I would not have YOU to be ignorant, my brothers and sisters
But I do not have to be gay to stand with
Other human beings who want the same rights that
We heterosexuals have

YOU want to know, fellow Christian, who despised me and decided I was/am
Less human than YOU because I have darker skin
YOU want to know brother/sister Christian, YOU who slight me because I say I am
Called to preach but I am the wrong gender for YOU to
Respect me and ask me to preach except on Women’s Day, No matter how well I preach
And how the Spirit uses me.

YOU want to know who am I to claim to be a Christian and to stand with my fellow human beings who believe God loves them as they are and made them as they are
YOU who lied about me, talked about me, tried to pull me down
Just yesterday

YOU want to make me what YOU despise
Because I stand with other human beings who want the rights YOU and I have
YOU want to know because you forgot or you conveniently dismissed
How many heterosexual men and women have abused women and children
Because they are perverse heterosexual men and women, many of who are
Like YOU Christians who hate and oppose gay men and women having rights
Rights they opposed and some still oppose for blacks and mixed couples

YOU who preach hard and long against gays as an abomination before God
And then YOU, self-proclaimed heterosexual preacher, have secretly sodomized, raped, fondled, cuddled with and loved others of your same sex
I remember the youth pastor, a married man with children, in Maryland who was found
Out… YOU know what I’m talking about

YOU know, YOU remember….Let me refresh your memory
About the pastor’s daughter in California who not so long ago raped and murdered
The little girl who attended her Sunday school class
YOU know the not so LONG ago priests/preachers who have abused the children
While YOU in the pews look the other way, support them
Or explain it away by claiming they must have been gay
As if gays are the only people capable of committing such sexual crimes

YOU know the church has its own “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy….
Always whispering about this one and that one
Yet the church roles and rolls on

Don’t YOU know that my grandfather was a heterosexual male, married four times
Don’t YOU know he was a deacon in the Baptist church
Don’t YOU know he was the one who molested me and raped one of his own estranged daughters

YOU in the church, YOU who lied about me to my face without blinking an eye
YOU who continually stretch the truth but never admit to lying
YOU in the church, who dismiss the hungry and homeless by claiming they don’t exist
YOU who gossip, spread rumors, create confusion and dissension
If YOU say gays are an abomination before God because the Bible says so,
Then YOU have more in common than YOU care to admit
But you stand your ground as if your ground is holier….
And YOU want to know what?  What is it YOU want to know?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

wow! that was so powerful, and i know everyone that reads this will be touched as well as identify with some of the same pain.

WomanistNTProf said...

Thank you Anonymous for reading and responding!

carolyn b. lester said...

is this YOU, this particulate of a lumped mass of humanoids who digest without discernment, the even now contemporaries of those whom Jesus called hypocrites...and a brood of vipers?

WomanistNTProf said...

Yes, Carolyn Lester, likely the same YOU! Thanks for reading.