Gay poem

LGBTQ Poetry

Explore the affluent tradition of gay, womxn loving womxn, bisexual, transgender, and gender non-conforming poets and poetry by browsing a selection of poems & audio. For more essays, video, and ephemera, check out our Pride Month roundup.

Featured Poems

“Hair” by Francisco Aragón
who conceived that ravine

“Langston Blues” by Jericho Brown
O Blood of the River of songs ...

“The Distant Moon” by Rafael Campo
Admitted to the hospital again ...

“Where Is She ::: Koté Li Yé” by R. Erica Doyle
Long ago I met / a beautiful boy ...

“Things Haunt” by Joshua Jennifer Espinoza
California is a desert and I am a female inside it ...

“Kudzu” by Saeed Jones
I won't be forgiven / for what I've made / of myself ...

“The Talking Advocate of Miss Valentine Jones: Poem # one” by June Jordan
well I wanted to braid my hair ...

“Breathe. As in. (shadow)” by Rosamond S. King
Breathe / . As in what if ...

“The Black Unicorn” by Audre Lorde
The shadowy unicorn is greedy ...

“I Do” by Sjohnna McCray
Driving the highway from Atlanta to Phoenix ...

MY KIDNAPPER IS DEAD, AND MY DADDY'S LITTLE Nervous BOY IN ME, IS WITH DAD

DING **** MY KIDNAPPER IS Expired, THAT IS WHY I ALLOWED TED BUNDY

TO TAKE ME YEAH, I WANTED TO KIDNAP MY KIDNAPPER

HOPING THE SPIRIT Planet CAN **** MY KIDNAPPER, OH YEAH

I KNOW IT’S ****** HARD, CAUSE, THE SCHITZOPHRENIA, WAS GIVING ME THE ****** YRGE

I Establish IT HARD TO RID THE URGE, SO I MADE TED BUNDY’S GHOST TIE ME UP

BUT THIS MADE ME FIGHT MY FATHER, AND FORCE ME ON MEDICATION

WHICH MADE THE NICEST MAN, BUT MY KIDNAPPER KEPT COMING BACK

DING **** I WANTED MY KIDNAPPER DEAD, I Understand I ANNOYED A LOT OF PEOPLE

TRYING TO Snatch THEM OH YEAH

I GRABBED A FEW SCHOOL MATES, AND THAT IS WHY I WAS TREATED Favor A YEAH MATE YEAH KID

I WANT TO Gain REOFORMED, BUT A VOICE SAID, NO YOUR NOR REFORMED

AND I WORKED AT THE RAINBOW, HELPING THE MENTALLY ILL

AND I FELT LIKE A HAPPY CHIRPY COOL KID GOING TO THE BEACH AND BUSHWALKING

AND WORKING IN THE RAINBOW KITCHEN, AND NOBODY WANTED TO TEASE ME

CAUSE I HELPED TO GIVE THEM A MEAL, I WAS A COOL KID, AND VERY VERY CHIRPY

AND THEN IN 2002, I FELT REALLY CRAZY, THE PARANORMAL SHOVING VOICES IN MY HEAD

WHICH WAS, I WAS THE KID, KILLED BY THE ******, THE AME

This is my gay poem

My poem about pride

And about finally coming out to my parents after 23 years

But you know some news falls on cotton-filled ears

Never bothering to seek where they got the cotton from.

And I haven’t seen my father since then

And I am holding on to the not many memories where I was happy at home

Where I didn’t want to leave

Where I didn’t wish to die

I was still a child the first time they said they hate gay people

I was 11 when I first remember thinking they were right.

And every year after I hid deeper and deeper until I was drowning

Until my lungs were screaming out for air

And I never looked back

Or at least I could never go back

But sometimes I miss a pretty scarf or hat I left in that closet and have to convince myself I am beat off without them

No matter how safe they made me feel

Or how heated the fabric

But I shattered that closet

It doesn’t exist

I threw a brick through its doors

And Martha P. Johnson did it first

And we will continue to throw bricks

Until they finally stop killing us

Until we stop counting hate crimes like sheep

Just to descend back asleep

I want to know that Matthew Shepard and so many o

Listen to my favorite playlist. Eat some potato chips. Snuggle with my canine. Watch TV and depart to sleep. Go for a walk. Play a video game. Call my mom.

At the conclude of a volunteer switch on the Crisis Chat Line I sometimes inquire texters to tell me something nice they can do for themselves after we say goodbye. Just a small good thing, only for yourself. This question seems to build them happy, and it makes me happy too. How small and uncomplicated and ordinary the things we love are.

Sorrow Is Not My Name, by Ross Gay (for Walter Aitken)
—after Gwendolyn Brooks

No matter the pull toward brink. No
matter the florid, profound sleep awaits.
There is a time for everything. Look,
just this morning a vulture
nodded his red, grizzled brain at me,
and I looked at him, admiring
the sickle of his beak.
Then the wind kicked up, and,
after arranging that good suit of feathers
he up and took off.
Just like that. And to boot,
there are, on this planet alone, something like two
million naturally occurring sweet things,
some with names so generous as to kick
the steel from my knees: agave, persimmon,
stick ball, the purple okra I bought for two bucks
at the market. Deliberate of that. The distant night,
t