queer is a brick that sometimes you throw and sometimes you use to build something new. queer is a teenage boy crying on the curb, tossed out of his family the same way they toss out rotten food, and queer is the new family he forges with a fierceness he didn't know he had. queer is a girl in love with her best friend and a guy who finally learned the perfect technique for glitter eyeliner and a someone who is standing under a blue clear sky for the first time after decades in cloaked darkness. queer is trying out one name and then another until you feel like yourself. queer is criminal and queer is a sickness. queer is a riot. queer is a quilt so we never forget. queer is meeting eyes with a stranger and seeing them the same way they are seeing you. queer is a jacket that says just drop my body on the steps of the f.d.a. queer is a flag, a pin, a sticker. queer is to be hated and to choose love anyway. queer is accusation and queer is exaltation. queer is the sigh of relief to finally be free. queer is a raunchy joke and a quiet confession and a beloved embrace. queer is to wander without a destination, just looking to see what can be found. queer is resistance. queer is joy. queer is a rainbow, not stripes but colors blending into each other so we’re all the same, even when we’re different. and yeah, maybe queer is a slur, but it’s also a home with a mat on on the front porch that says, you are welcome here.
