(*please note this poem contains homophobia and homophobic slurs)

Would you rather watch static?

If indistinct figures moved in flashing

black and white, no gender, no sex

identified, would you still care

who they are and if it is acceptable

for them to love before your eyes?

 

Would you rather stare at a blank

screen than see an array of colours,

bright and beautiful and – it’ll be

your own reflection that you see,

just you, like you, not like me –

black and blue, grey and grey,

saturate the spectrum, won’t you?

 

Will you grip the remote until the

buttons break, break like my heart,

collapsed inside the case? Will the

battery fluid pool under your nails,

spread distaste on your food,

mix with bile on your tongue, like my

name when I announce who I am?

 

I am like them. The ones who curl

your upper lip, change the channel,

don’t look at this shit. There will

be no fags in this house, neither

on the television nor in our living room.

Girls should not kiss girls.

Boys should not kiss boys.

There is no other way than the way

the god you don’t believe in

intended there to be.

 

What will you say? It is a disgrace

that they broadcast queer affection

before watershed, getting their agenda

in the children’s heads?

They are everywhere now,

every storyline in every soap,

every comedy, every host,

every question on the quiz shows,

and here still the punchline of every joke.

No one was gay back in my day.

No one is gay in our family.

 

Please don’t try to mute me.

 

Don’t close your eyes, lean back

in your armchair, pretend I am not

there, because I am not the girl

you thought you raised.

This script will not change.

But camera angles do. Can you see me

from a different view? Stop watching

propaganda on the news and look

at your daughter.

 

Could you, one day, smile

at two brides kissing?

Will you play my wedding tape

on your television?

 

© Elfie

Elfie is a queer writer from Derbyshire, England. She is a co-founder and former editor of Derby University’s Writer’s Block magazine and has a Master of Arts in publishing. When she isn’t writing, she plays the piano and watches horror films with her grandparents. Elfie can be found at @elfieinbloom on Twitter.