Child of Elros

[NB: I originally wrote this on October 7th, shortly after Occupy Philadelphia began.  I had kept it private for a while.]

i did not know that

being beaten and spit on by cishetero bullies

egged on by cishetero adults in power suits

and somehow managing to claw my way

to some level of financial security

at the cost of my sanity

sacrificed to those same cishetero adults in power suits

then deciding to stop lying to my self

and come out

and watching my income drop by 60%

then being unemployed for 30 months

and losing my home

and losing my health insurance

and losing my sanity

and losing my health

then getting a glimmer of hope

(wow, i can buy food and gas this month

without dipping into my dwindling savings)

and having that hope dashed

by people wearing power suits

as my body hurts:

nerves in my leg freaking out

muscles in my back freaking out

(they don't deal well with a spine bent to one side)

shoulders freezing up

thyroid burnt out

mind patched up with drugs

that i cannot afford:

i did not know that being all that

and daring to be angry at those with the power suits

and daring to give public voice

to my anger

together with thousands of other people

daring to give public voice

to our anger

makes me a hipster

but if so

then so be it.