To be homosexual in any part of the world is difficult. To be homosexual in an immigrant family, South Indian origin, US-South based, and in the context of the1990s and 2000s is…complicated. The USA is a country with a lot to offer. It is also extremely racist. In those years, it was very much a country of you-can-belong-to-it-but only if-you-act-like-everyone-else.
Five Poems On Growing Up As A Homosexual In Southern USA
Five poems written by Kiran Bhat, each one trying to imagine what each year in his life meant to him, from birth to adulthood.
It’s a hard vacuum to be brought up in. Your parents want you to act one way, you act another…and you are gay in a part of the world that believes homosexuality is a sin, to parents who were taught that homosexuality is a disease.
I was traumatised time and time again by my upbringing. Growing up, I felt like I was alone in having experienced what I have. As I get older and met fellow LGBTQI people from all over the planet, I realised we go through something universal. From a very young age, we are taught that our way of orienting ourselves to the world is wrong. We go through a lot of discrimination and lack of inclusion, harassment, or segregation. It happens either subtly or very bluntly, but it affects us all the same, whether we were born in Stellenbosch or outside of Taipei. I don’t know if there’s an LGBTQI person who isn’t a little bit messed up in the head.
I really would like to meet one, honestly.
For Pride Month, I want to muse on a collection of poems I wrote in Spanish called autobiografía
(soon to be published in English as part of a greater compilation, Speaking in Tongues, coming out with Red River this August). The collection is a compilation of 29 poems, each one trying to imagine what each year in my life meant to me, from birth to adulthood (I was 29 when I finished the collection).
I could have chosen to write this in English, but I wanted to write in Spanish, because these experiences are painful, and I wanted to be emotionally distant. In fact, for many years, I didn’t write about anything involving myself at all. I wanted to be far as possible away from myself and who I was. I probably wouldn’t have even written this collection if my therapist hadn’t told me very pointedly that I needed to confront my past to heal as an adult.
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I’m glad she did. In many ways, we as LGBTQI people are shamed out of our narratives. Even I’m afraid in certain ways to publish these poems, in fear for how they might affect my parents, and the people I love the most.
But shame is something that has caged so many of us, and if we always live in this fear, no one will learn the courage to speak out.
So I must be courageous, and I must share my truth.
I am not proud of my experiences, but I must let them exist.
This Pride Month, please enjoy this selection of poems, represented in both Spanish and English, dedicated to all those who are courageously different, and are learning to be proud of who they are.
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1994
Once my mother put me in a red dress and took photos of me
while I was dancing around
she now thinks that doing this is one of the reasons why I ended up gay.
Not really...
I barely remember that day
I doubt it was something that made me who I am.
If a child is playing without thinking,
it’s an act of innocence;
it has no sexual meaning at all.
I’m not gay because of anything you did
I’m gay because that’s what nature bestowed upon me
and, I don’t stand up to what nature says
I’m not arrogant enough to change the order of the universe.
I simply have to be me.
There was another day while I was this age
when I was in the office of my parents’ clinic
waiting for them to finish work
I saw a picture book rendering the story of Adam and Eve.
I saw Adam’s chest — so ornately drawn, so glossy —
only his privates were covered, but not the rest of his body.
I stared at this page,
for minutes upon minutes
with lust, with hunger, with ecstasy
but first and foremost, as a child completely unconscious
of what the norms were meant to be.
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1994
Una vez mi madre me vistió con una falda suelta roja,
y tiró fotos de mí,
mientras yo me pavoneaba como el venado.
Ella todavía piensa que esa decisión es una de las razones por las que soy gay.
No, mami.
Si es una memoria que no me acuerdo sin un recuerdo no sería un incidente que me formó.
Si un niño hace cabriolas,
gira su cuerpo a un canto imaginario, es un acto de inocencia,
nada que ver con su sexualidad.
No soy un gay a causa de lo que hacías.
Soy un gay porque es una parte de la naturaleza,
ordenada también por la naturaleza.
Y no soy, afronto la naturaleza.
Y yo, como yo era a esa edad,
un día, en el despacho de la oficina de mi padre,
vi un libro que él tenía para sus pacientes.
Era una rendición de la historia de Adán y Eva, dibujado.
Vi los pechos de Adán
glosados por el estilo de dibujo,
sus partes privadas cubiertas en un hoja,
pero sus pezones jugosos.
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Yo permanecí mirando esa página
minutos enteros,
con lascivia, con alegría,
pero ante todo como un niño,
inconsciente, de las normas de un ser.
2003
It’s math class.
I’m in the second line in the middle
trying to listen to my teacher,
an old man, with a very droll voice,
but I have to keep my legs clutched together,
because something is growing in between them,
and I have to keep it hidden.
In my head I’m in the jungle covered all about in leaves
and coming out of the thatch are men and women,
completely naked,
breasts out and perked,
uncircumcised penises waiting to be touched,
licking whomever they feel like,
kissing whomever they feel like,
nothing of their bodies covered.
It’s just an orgy and I’m in the middle imagining it all.
It’s like having a button to an atomic bomb and pressing it just to have fun.
It’s like eating cake for the first time and eating all of it,
because you can.
It’s like losing control and fully enjoying it,
which is what we do when we never learn control.
I’m of the conviction that every child is a bisexual
because I remember so many scenes like this
just curious about sex, not caring about gender.
It was savage, primitive, human
what I was meant to be
but what society did not make me become.
2003
En una clase de matemática,
yo, en la segunda fila del medio,
intentando escuchar a mi profesor, un viejo,
pero estoy agarrando mis piernas juntas
en el intento de ocultar lo que está creciendo entre ellas.
En mi cabeza vivo en el campo,
la tierra mojada por hojas de arce,
y dentro de las chozas son
mujeres y hombres, desnudos,
yo, entre ellos, mi cabeza encima de los pezones,
lamiendo cualquier parte de su cuerpo,
besando a cualquier persona que pudiera,
nuestros cuerpos cubiertos por cardos
una orgía entre Amazonas
y yo un cisne, aleteando a sus pies.
Yo me imagino que cada niño de esa edad es bisexual
porque me acuerdo de muchas escenas así,
curiosa por todo sexo, sin importar el género.
Para ser un adolescente
es abrirse a las debilidades, necesidades y perversidades de un adulto.
Sin comprender el cuerpo.
Es como tener el gatillo de la bomba atómica y empujarlo para divertirse.
Es como poder comer pastel por primera vez y luego comer todo, porque puedes.
Es como poder permitirte no controlarte por primera vez en tu vida.
Es como ser salvaje,
primitivo,
un ser humano, propiamente,
cuando hoy en día es una dificultad.
2004
At that age,
I looked to the universe and screamed,
‘Of all things, why did I have to be this way?’
Whereas before I had senses
that allowed everything to belong to me
they had narrowed
and left inside of me, only what my society would deem perversity.
— in other words —
I was researching Greek Gods for a school project,
I was looking up pictures of Dionysus.
The picture I found was not that of an old man drunk off of wine,
it was the drawing of a youth, curly blonde hair,
pink puffed nipples,
vines not covering him,
only draping him, in parts.
He was completely naked,
he was hard.
I grew in places and in ways I never knew I could
what was worse was that I could not control my hand either.
I touched myself there. I grabbed myself there. I pulled myself there.
It was instinct.
It was what felt natural.
Seconds later, I felt something rushing.
It had never happened before.
I immediately covered myself with my underwear, but it squirted out.
It was the drench that not only soiled my clothes
but my hand, the floor, the smell of the air.
It soiled everything.
I went to the shower
I washed out everything.
The night after
I tried to imagine the goddess Isis and did the same thing
but imagining myself inside of her putting it inside of her
making her body mine for the taking.
It worked.
I could also come.
A part of me felt happy,
a part of me felt like I could be normal
nevertheless these words were aching me as I tried to sleep:
‘So, this, this of all horrible things, is what I was going to have to be.’
2004
A esa edad,
miré al universo y grité: «¿Por qué me hiciste eso?».
Mientras antes yo tenía los juicios que permitían pertenecer a todo,
se habían estrechado,
y dejé dentro de mí eso,
lo que la sociedad llamaría una perversidad.
En otras palabras...
Estaba investigando dioses griegos para un proyecto escolar,
estaba ante todo buscando fotos de Dioniso.
La imagen que encontré no era la de un anciano bebido de vino.
Vi un dibujo de un joven,
cabello rubio rizado,
pezones hinchados rosa,
viñas que no lo cubren,
solo envolviéndolo en partes.
Él estaba completamente desnudo.
Él era duro.
Crecí en lugares y de maneras que nunca supe que podía.
Y lo peor fue que tampoco pude controlar mi mano.
Me toqué allí.
Me agarré allí.
Me tiré allí.
Fue instinto.
Era lo que se sentía natural.
Segundos después,
sentí algo corriendo apresuradamente.
Nunca había pasado antes.
Inmediatamente me cubrí con mi ropa interior,
pero se echó a chorros.
Fue la ráfaga que no solo ensució mi ropa,
también mi mano, el suelo, el olor del aire.
Ensució todo.
Fui a la ducha,
me lavé todo.
La noche siguiente traté de imaginar a la diosa Isis,
e hice lo mismo,
pero imaginándome dentro de ella,
poniéndolo dentro de ella.
Funcionó.
Pero no pude pensar mientras intentaba dormir.
«Entonces, esto, esto de todas las cosas horribles, es lo que tendré que ser».
2007
I was a sexual harasser
that is what it seemed
that is what they called me,
and after they did they destroyed my life.
Let me explain.
It wasn’t that I was flirting with him, my debate partner.
We were in his room
preparing for our speeches.
It was the middle of the night
on a summer day at Dartmouth
hot, muggy, sticky
and I liked to joke,
I liked to make comments about sex,
so I asked if he wanted to fuck me.
I was a virgin
I had no interest in having sex with him.
He was a short and stump boy,
prickly hair on his head, a nasal accent,
and I also had the impression that he was gay,
closeted,
but I didn’t like him at all that way.
I just wanted to mess around.
The next day
I was summoned to the head of the debate camp’s dorm.
I was told that I had sexually harassed a student.
Apparently my debate partner had complained about my behaviour
and felt uncomfortable being around me.
I told them I was joking.
I told them I didn’t mean it.
I told them I would never do it again.
This wasn’t enough.
The dorm-master, hair matted in a baseball cap,
a voice effeminate enough to do drag,
told me that he had called my parents
and told them that I had sexually harassed a student.
I called them back, teary-eyed as they asked, ‘Is it true?’
I had to tell them I was gay.
I wasn’t able to control my voice,
nor constrain my hands, or my actions.
This was threatening to them.
They told me to grab my things, and to pack, they were kicking me out.
When I protested, they took me,
forced me to sit in a chair
and I could not move.
I was supposed to sleep in that chair for five hours,
I could not.
The morning after, I was sent back by bus and then plane, to my home.
It was no easy conversation to be had with my parents.
They were convinced it was something which could be solved.
Later they would confiscate my laptop and phone,
they would fly me to different states to see psychologists,
they forced one of them to stay with me for some days to talk sense to me.
I hated it all.
One moment this psychologist was not paying attention
and I rammed myself into my room,
I packed my bag and I ran out of the door,
calling one of my cousins to pick me up.
I was so afraid the psychologist would find me
I didn’t even put on my shoes.
I ran barefoot
and I stayed with my uncle for some days.
This scared my parents
and they told the psychologist to leave.
Later, my camp’s dorm counsellor committed suicide
but, I, the pervert,
the deserter,
the vagabond,
the traitor to tradition,
the resister to remorse,
never changed.
2007
Que yo era un pervertido,
acosando a otro de mi campo de debate.
Esa era la acusación que destruyó mi vida.
Déjame explicar.
No era que yo quería ligar con él,
con mi compañero de debate.
Estábamos en su cuarto,
preparando nuestro discurso.
Era de noche,
un día de verano,
caluroso, venenoso.
Yo, siempre de broma,
le pregunto si quería joderme.
Yo era virgen
y yo no tenía química sexual con él.
Era un chico achaparrado y bajo,
pelo espinoso en la cabeza,
el acento nasal de un judío americano.
Yo tuve la impresión de que él podría estar en el armario,
pero realmente no quería tener sexo con él.
Por la noche del día siguiente,
yo fui convocado al jefe del dormitorio del campo de debate.
Me dijeron que había acosado sexualmente a un estudiante.
«¿Yo,en serio? Yo».
Aparentemente mi compañero de debate se había quejado.
Les dije que estaba bromeando.
Les dije que no le quise decir algo ofensivo.
Les dije que nunca lo volvería a hacer.
Esto no fue suficiente.
El jefe de la residencia,
el pelo enredado en una gorra de béisbol,
una voz afeminada de los suyos,
y gestos a juego.
Me dijo que había llamado a mis padres
y les dijo que había acosado sexualmente a una estudiante.
Les devolví la llamada,
ojos llorosos,
ellos preguntándome: «¿Es cierto?».
Tuve que decirles que era gay.
No pude controlar mi voz,
ni restringir mis manos, ni mis acciones.
Las amenazaban.
Me dijeron que yo debería tomar mis cosas y empacarlas.
Me estaban echando del campo.
Cuando protesté,
me llevaron a un cuarto oscuro,
y me obligó a sentarme en una silla
y no pude moverme.
Se suponía que yo debía dormir en esa silla, pero no pude.
A la mañana siguiente, me enviaron de vuelta,
en autobús y luego en avión, para mi casa.
No fue una conversación fácil con mis padres.
Pero estaban convencidos de que era algo
que podría resolverse.
Confiscaron mi laptop y mi teléfono,
llevaron a diferentes estados para ver psicólogos,
forzaron a uno de ellos a quedarse conmigo por algunos días
para convencerme a ser un heterosexual.
Yo odiaba todo.
Un día el psicólogo no prestaba atención
y me metí en mi habitación,
empaqué mi bolsa
y salí corriendo por la puerta,
llamando a uno de mis primos para que me recoja.
Yo tenía tanto miedo de que él me encontrara,
ni siquiera me puse mis zapatos,
corrí descalzo.
Me quedé con mi tío por algunos días.
Esto asustó a mis padres
y le dijeron al psicólogo que se fuera.
Me invitaron a entrar de nuevo a su casa,
pero esto nunca impidió que mi madre se deslizara,
que yo era una maldición para nuestra familia,
y nunca me dejó solo frente a mis sobrinos
por miedo a que les molestara.
Más tarde, el consejero del dormitorio del campo se suicidó.
Pero yo,
el pervertido, el desertor,
el vagabundo,
el traidor a la tradición,
el resistir al remordimiento, nunca cambié.
2016
The seeds of maturity
aren’t sewn in a matter of days
nor much in a matter of time
but rather through
the set of experiences that we have
and more importantly
through the nature of our interactions.
Though I have travelled much
though I have hopped through the eras
though I have observed all corners of the earth
all walks of life
I believe I have seen much
I believe it has changed me
but this has little matured me
compared to when I have to take care of others
By helping others
I learn once more
what it means to know nothing
what it means to want to learn
and I put their needs over mine
from my own venison
I let another body form.
2016
Las semillas de la madurez
no son cosidas en algunos días,
pero están dispersadas a través de
las experiencias que tenemos,
y más importante,
a través del desarrollo de nuestras interacciones.
Aunque he viajado mucho,
aunque he observado todos los rincones de la tierra,
todos los ámbitos de la vida,
he visto mucho,
creo que me ha cambiado,
pero me ha madurado poco,
comparado con cuando tengo que cuidar a alguien diferente,
por ejemplo, como cuando enseño a mis alumnos
y ellos son pichones.
Todavía entendiendo los conceptos básicos de este mundo.
Y tengo que enseñarles.
Y aprender una vez más
lo que significa no saber nada,
lo que significa querer aprender,
y poner las necesidades de los demás sobre las mías,
dejar de mi propio venado el sustento de otra forma corporal.
Creo que esta es la manera más verdadera de madurez
y solo puede venir
cuando un anciano da licencia completa a un joven crecer.
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