Meditations for Queer Femmes — Stream of Consciousness on the Services of the Pervert, Continued

Until childhood is freed from repressive contracts of innocence and ignorance and until the family as an institution is neither romanticized nor sentimentalized, society will seek, require, and even demand the services of the pervert. –Eric Rofes, Status Quo or Status Queer? A Radical Rethinking of Sexuality and Schooling, 2005

Queer femmes are magicians, mistresses of subterfuge, and supremely in your face. Queer femmes are perverts. We are perverts who no longer waste our time and energy being in service to and trying to change the homodestructive status quo. We are perverts, loudly, proudly. Because what is a pervert other than someone who bends, twists, evades, and decimates the rules? Rules made by straight white cis men in their fury and ignorance and lonely paucity of spirit.

We queer femme perverts no longer try to fit in: we flame and glitter for no one but ourselves and those we love. Our love is perverted and huge. Our perverted love defies boundaries.

Queer femmes are true to our perverted gifts. We use them to call our own to us, to bolster perverts everywhere. We use our perverted femme magic to find our own perverted femme path and we tread stompingly in wedges, running shoes, pumps, jellies, orthotics, Doc Martins on the pervert path to glory, submission, domination, sexual satisfaction and everywhere coming up rainbows.

We queer femme perverts dig deep into our perversion, coming up with rich, life-giving thoughts, actions, memories, access. Our perversion, the brilliance of our perversion that interrupts programming as usual, that intersects with the fight and glory of perverts of other stripes and journeys, and that makes us magicians and connects us to the holy.

We say FEMME LOVE

We say FEMME LOVE HEAL

We say FEMME LOVE HEAL WORLD

There is no limit to our queer femme pervert power.

Every Monday, I offer a Meditation for Queer Femmes, in the spirit of my maternal grandmother, Mimi, who was fabulous, and from whom I inherited her Meditations for Women.

 

 

 

 

Published in: on October 2, 2017 at 10:04 AM  Comments (2)  
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Meditations for Queer Femmes — Queer Femme Stream of Consciousness on the Services of the Pervert

Until childhood is freed from repressive constructs of innocence and ignorance and until the family as an institution is neither romanticized nor sentimentalized, society will seek, require, and even demand the services of the pervert. –Eric Rofes, Status Quo or Status Queer? A Radical Rethinking of Sexuality and Schooling, 2005

We queer femmes choose rather to be of service to ourselves, to each other, and, in the end and in the interconnected way of love, of service to all living beings. We are aware of the status quo’s nefarious co-optive power over, and we choose to put our energy into our own, unique, queer femme ways of disrupting, rethinking, building up and tearing down. Starting with our own deep love of our queer bodies, our full selves, our beautiful brains, our sexual magic and all of our queer doings, we spread the love in surprising, bountiful and polyphonic fashion. For those younger than us, we choose to be of service by modeling queer adult lives that are nuanced and interesting, filled with mistakes, sublime moments, robust humor, and lots of sex. For our peers, we choose to be of service by listening, laughing with, taking charge and letting go, allowing ourselves to be mystified, enlightened, uncomfortable and always in solidarity. For our elders, we stay present, respectful, delighted as well as repeating all of the above.

We are of service, yes! oh yes. We are of service and in service to better, sweeter, longer, this community, this lovely, this sweet world, in service so queerly, so healing, so dear.

Every Monday, I offer a Meditation for Queer Femmes, in the spirit of my maternal grandmother, Mimi, who was fabulous, and from whom I inherited her Meditations for Women.

Published in: on September 25, 2017 at 6:17 PM  Comments (2)  
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Femme Friday — Jewelle Gomez

I have here on my desk a signed copy of the 25th Anniversary Edition of Jewelle Gomez’s novel, The Gilda Stories, a treasure in 1991 when it was first published, and a treasure still. I had the great good fortune to take part in an all-day workshop Jewelle co-led at the Creating Change conference last Thursday. (Having inadvertently left my copy behind, I rushed off to Giovanni’s Room during lunch and, thank goodness, Jewelle’s book was in stock!) The workshop, “Thriving: The Eric Rofes Legacy: Envisioning a Transformative Queer Movement Focused on Sex, Health, Politics, and Liberation”, points to the focus of Jewelle’s activism which is expressed in story and direct action: sexy, wholesome, politically wise and profoundly liberatory.

“Hold out your hand, doesn’t matter which one,” said Jewelle last Thursday, in a closing ritual. 40+ queers reached out. Jewelle read the words of her ancestor, Chief Seattle, about connection, then cast a lifeline out to us. She told us we are connected, now, and that we are all holding onto the lifeline. To remember that, to envision the connection when we need strength and support. The love and power in that room at that moment was queer magic that I will never forget, that is sustaining me now as I write and that will continue to do so for life.

And now you, dear reader: hold out your hand!

Deep gratitude to Jewelle Gomez!

One summer evening BC (before cell phones), my home telephone was out of order so I strolled down to the corner in the musky urban night air of Manhattan to call a friend from a phone booth. As I was talking two male passersby started telling me in lewd detail what sex acts they would like to perform on me. I thought about the fact that women go through this debasement regularly, routinely. How we usually steel ourselves and block it out. But this time, on that evening long ago, rage welled up in me like a tidal wave. I told my friend on the other end of the line to hold on.

I turned on the two men and began screaming like a mythical banshee. I could see that they thought I was overreacting – they were “just being guys.” But my harangue exploded uncontrollably, stripping away their macho posturing. One man yelled desperately to the other, “Brother, she’s crazy!” He clutched at his friend’s arm and they fled down the street away from me. I was shaking with the pen-up fury of all the women who’ve ever been harassed on the street. I came back to myself when I heard my friend, terrified that I was being murdered, shouting my name through the telephone receiver. I thought with shock that if I had had a weapon in hand I would have gleefully beaten or shot or stabbed or bombed those two guys. Instead I went back to my flat and wrote the first installment of what would become The Gilda Stories. –The Gilda Stories, Forward, July 2015

Every Friday, I showcase a queer femme goddess. Suggestions welcome!

Published in: on January 27, 2017 at 1:19 PM  Leave a Comment  
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