existing in queer spaces as a black nonbinary individual

giovanni (they/them)

i talk best through poetry. this is probably the case because of how the words are always more than what they are literally written out to be. my experience of being in queer spaces here at michigan are a mixture of things. but overall, since this is a predominantly white institution and black people in general only make up 3% of the population and black trans people even less than that, i always find myself longing to be with more people who share more of my identities than just queerness. and even though i still am a part of those spaces, there are often times a disconnect between the things i feel and what others in those spaces see from me. this three-part piece attempts to explore a few of these lenses.

my neighborhood in Detroit is really beautiful in spring. the branches feel like extensions of myself, and are a perfect representation of my position in this piece. photo by giovanni.

I. it’s just a cup of tea & i’m just barely visible

somebody eyes        and another’s     and another’s
and i try to keep my breath from growing
from forming the words     i don’t belong here
but then it swole then popped like a balloon             

the truth is my trans black body feels like a stain on yt shoe

so when the yt woman needs to get pass
i drive myself into the wall      dissolve into the paint and drywall
my transformation doesn’t catch her attention
this manufactured shell 
this makeshift corner i push myself into so she could have the rest of everything 

i spill my whole tea on the floor of the coffee shop     and they peek over macs & mugs & beanies & backpacks 

i think they mistook me for a napkin 

II. things hoped for 

mylicia and i step in and then we stop searching    

we’ve already expected we the only black people at the function
and we don’t sweat it because everyone seems like cool people
and we’re used to the feeling of empty air     

in the middle of our 1st cup     we spot    another black person who’s in the frat 
and that’s what keeps a lamp full of hope lit in my chest

like maybe i could stay a while longer and someone won’t          look
at me like my blackness will rub off on the couch     or like i could make the rain indoors
last for days all because  my gender feels more like water  and mud hills sometimes 

my homie and i look at each other after our 3rd(4th) cup and get up to leave     after
the other black person gets the whole house chirping in laughter at a racist part of the movie


III. i’m an ocean, i’m a whisper, i don’t say anything else 

pearly ytness said i did a good job    they clapped and smiled and called it lovely 
it was lovely i think     i did do a good job i think   i know i tried to exhale 
on the page   and write something to make up  for the space  i can’t fill with passion

with the empty i have inside   i got a lot of empty inside this brown skin  but somehow every time i recite these words i always am    told how lovely they are  so lovely  and all i can think about is  the pouring 

i got so much to pour out of my nothingness   and i keep pouring and let my flood turn out a drought

sometimes i get more nothing and i just look back at the mirror in front of me        i’m uncertain of the words and all its contradictions   all my contradictions stacked and jigsawed until it made a quilt of something  but sometimes that something is just more sand than ocean and i’m still told it’s lovely   

only brown lips ever told me to be more honest 
to look deeper  
and to not be afraid

---