I used to write about Assotto Saint
Slamming his hand down on the pulpit at Donald Wood’s funeral
when it was common to hide the cause of death of
young men who’d died from AIDS if they were buried at all
and weren’t abandoned
Someone told me about a thin boy
Thin with fear and death
played piano for the choir
no one touched him or talked about it
I know in my mother’s family
her mother’s sister said a parasite had killed
her son when he died suddenly
But I remember once him coming out of a Gay bar in Boston
all the white boys said, “How do you know her?”
I don’t know if he or I said cousin
I’m his cousin
He made me promise not to tell anyone in the family
I’d seen him there
So when they said parasite I knew something didn’t ring true
His mother a seemingly healthy woman died shortly after that
but I always felt their deaths were related
His mother either from the lies or repression
or a broken heart
having lost her young son
And I know everyone blames Jussie Smollett for his lies and staged attacked
but it makes me think there was something very toxic going on
that he didn’t feel he could talk to someone
Either that he was covering up an addiction or a hookup.
Watching Assotto stand up at Donald’s funeral and tell the truth
goes down in history as one of the bravest moments I’d ever witnessed
Either that or Audre Lorde spreading open the arms of her dashiki
the bravest woman we’d all witnessed
telling a crowded room of followers
I began on this journey as a coward
That or seeing a friend at the height of the AIDS era
at a bar his face covered in purple welts
refusing to hide
going out in public
That or Donald Woods being feeble
barely able to walk
accepting an award as a director of AIDS films
Or an ex-lover on a beach taking off her top and refusing
to hide her mastectomy scar
Or when Danitra Vance performed at The Public Theater
and danced naked revealing her mastectomy scars
and Audre refusing to wear a prosthesis
Or when Zakes Mokae in Master Harold and the Boys in the first Broadway play
that a cousin took me too
said to his white master, “Have you ever seen a Black man’s ass?”
and pulled down his pants and revealed himself to the audience
I was sixteen years old
Or seeing my mother beaten religiously
and still go out to work as if it hadn’t happened at all
Or even me surviving so many incredible tests
Once when I was talking to a doctor, I doubted my strength
He looked at me incredulously and said, “You are strong.”
Another doctor looked at me
my suffering
And asked isn’t anyone there for you?
And another said you deserve to be taken care of
Today once more I am nursing my broken heart
Caused by someone who betrayed
was not honest
That and attending an event and asking white people to give up
their seats to Black people who couldn’t sit down
And seeing social justice in action
Yes I often think of Assotto for the important place
he resides in my history
But today I am examining his tactics
pulling the tools off the shelf
dusting off the weaponry
in an exhibit
because today I need to use what he taught me.
Today I feel that puff of rage
That continuous assault
And I want to stand up and testify
though I too haven’t been asked
I want to interrupt all the proceedings
all the places Black lesbians have been erased
and silenced
Like looking down at a manuscript
seeing that they asked a young white woman to write about
Black queer history
when it’s been my area of expertise
forever
Or only attributing ’80s and ’90s AIDS activism
To ACT UP
I want the point of outrage now to not only the historicizing of AIDS
But the fact that women and Black lesbians
have been erased from the dialogue
When there were so many organizations like GMAD
Other countries ADODI
Men of All Colors Together
Salsa Soul/Arican American lesbians united for Societal Change
Las Buenas Amigas
and more
Or asking where are all the Black lesbians on Pose
because certainly they were on the piers and part of that history
And why are white men constantly at the helm
to tell our stories
And why don’t white queers recognize this
That and seeing panel after panel being organized on history and art
all things important to the world and no one thinking or noticing
it might be important to have a Black lesbian present
Just like they kicked Stormé out of
the Stonewall narrative.
And what about the people who weren’t on the streets
but in jobs
fighting the system
The dykes and queers
meeting each other forming community
and connections and families
and love
Just like in South Africa where they prevented intermingling
but ways were found
And each time we touched or loved
found each other in darkness and light
It was resistance
Each time we told each other You’re beautiful
You’re not wrong
It was resistance
When we stood up to the parents and families
and courts and those that shunned us
It was resistance
Wore what we really wanted
It was resistance
Yelled at doctors and drug professionals
It was resistance
Every time we wrote and read poems
It was resistance
Every time some queer kid
stays alive because they saw us
read us
discovered the archive
We’ve won
Every war is fought on our bodies
And one day after the gender racial
sexual orientation wars are over
in America
there will be a new generation
just like in South Africa called
the Born Frees.
—2019
Watch Pamela Sneed read a version of this poem at the 2019 Stonewall 50 reading.
Copyright © 2019 Pamela Sneed. Used with permission of the poet. Videography by James Matthew Proctor, event co-hosted by Poetry Project and Lambda Literary.