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By Dan Smith
You are strong and mean and violent.
Alone and in groups of two or three, you have beat us and hung us from fences for so many centuries it seems right to you. You think we are weak and mild and puny, because we give way before you. But we prefer caresses to the ax, and when hit, swallow our blood in silence. Why would you want us to be your soldiers, and why would we want to be your soldiers?
silent in the shadow. We have put away war for love and lust. But if you would give us uniforms, we would march across the world and slay all before us. If you would have us kill and rape for you, and have us tear the jewels from bloody hands, Let us have our lust and love, and uniforms and we will march across the world for you.
You have heard of Stonewall
when we were soldiers in dresses. Spontaneous anger not soon defused. We awoke from a millennium of oppression, dazed, disordered, but AWARE again. Several months later I stood a block from Gay Street and saw a trash can explode and tear the eye out of a brother. Saw a great crowd of people run into a wall of police and saw that wall buckle and dissolve, saw the police fall under the feet of anger--- and was glad. Then a bus of badges and another bus of badges. A wall formed again and reached out, grabbed a poor soul and left his blood all over the street. Did we buckle? Did we dissolve? No, Hank Ferrari ran into the pool of red, reached down and threw handfulls of blood onto his face. Held out his hands for all to see and screamed "This is the blood of your brother, wear it!" The crowd--- they and me marched forward, dipped our hands into the blood till the pavement was dry. We wiped our hands on cheeks and eyes, then stood, as those who came too late for pavement blood pressed their hands and tears on our cheeks and eyes. All red we rushed the buses. Rocking them we hissed. The police, angry then afraid stayed in the buses and were silent.
But we did not have uniforms,
so we dissolved into the night. But me remembered the taste and warmth of blood. We who have marched across the world and torn nations apart. If we had uniforms, we would have stood and fought and died, shoulder to shoulder, head to crotch, eye to toe. Why would you have us be your soldiers? Because we would be loud in love and lust and war. And why would we want to be your soldiers? So that we could lay in the fields at night and feel the warmth in each other's uniforms. And in the morning awake to tear the heads from infants and break open the treasuries of your enemies. We would be happy to live in love and lust and war, and would die uncomplaining in the dust; As long as it was together and in uniform. Dan Smith is an artist who has lived in the Castro district for 28 years. He was born in Colby, Kansas, in 1944, and later spent a number of years living abroad from 1956 to 1958 in Japan, where he was impressed with Asian sensibilities in art and religion, eventually becoming a Buddhist' and from 1965 to 1967 in France, while serving in the US Army. Dan lived in New York City from 1967-1971, and was one of the founding members of the Gay Liberation Front, which was born shortly after the famous Stonewall Riot in June 1969. |
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