this is what i mean when i say queer.

when i say queer i mean, most of the time i feel fucking gay.
when i say queer i mean having sexual fantasies about girls
at the age of 13 and thought i was a human monster, a hermaphrodite, a psycho freak.
when i say queer i mean not even knew that sex was possible,
until i discovered lesbian chat room and was talked dirty
and unpleasantly seduced by an older woman.
when i say queer i mean feeling rejected and being emotionally
shut down in my family for at least 10 years.
when i say queer i mean i did a lot of fucked up things to people i love because i simply did not know how to love myself.
when i say queer i mean my lover committed suicide when i was 17
and i thought about death every day and night for the 3 years after that.

when i say queer i mean i'm not the white power gays who only worry about their cocktail parties, their newly remodeled house, their muscle mass, or their summer exotic southeast asian trips.
when i say queer i mean i struggle to even be recognized as a person with something important to say, because of my skin color, my accent, my gender, my learned defensiveness with most white straight men and my failure
to relate to them or treat their ignorance patiently.
when i say queer i mean strange men yell dyke at me and give dirty looks and threesome jokes when i walk with my lover in the street .
when i say queer i mean i loathed my body because it was too feminine, too masculine, too weak, too small, too awkward, and too foreign.
when i say queer i mean it took me a borderline eating disorder to love my own body.
when i say queer i mean i cried the first time i had sex with a woman because it changed everything i thought about the world.
when i say queer i mean people i love are traumatized by patriarchal violence physically, emotionally, and constantly.
when i say queer i mean i am fed up with being the token lesbian and the token asian and the token immigrant in every space.
when i say queer i mean i am so sick and tired of being polite and politically correct.
when i say queer i mean i am not gonna explain myself anymore.

when i say queer i mean seeing my queer friends find themselves, lose themselves, doubt themselves, risk themselves, and hurt themselves because of shame.
when i say queer i mean fear of not being able to recreate
the sense of community and family we once had.
when i say queer i mean i feel resentful when my straight friends
off to get married one by one. i feel betrayed.
and then i feel powerlessness.

when i say queer it is agony.
it is silence.
it is grief.
but it is also desire.
it is passion.
it is love.

when i say queer it is not about my biology my brain cells my ring finger or aboout social construction or fucked up family dynamics or capitalism or the oppressive human nature.
it is about my life.
when i say i am queer it's not about trendiness or progressiveness or the right consciousness.
it is still about my life.
when i say queer i mean i don't worry about alienating straight folks and being too confrontational, too aggressive, or too shamless.
when i say queer i mean i don't care if the corporates don't get to sell a piece of our oppression.
when i say queer i mean the gay power movement was co-opted by white middle class assimilationists and it's time for us trans folks and queer folks of color to take back the movement.
when i say queer i mean i want to fight alongside other oppressed folks
not because we are all the same but because we have the rights
to live as different as we fucking wish.
when i say queer i need to say it repetitively because our youth are homeless or home beaten up or dissecting themselves with razor blade.
when i say queer i need to say it repetitively because we are divided by borders, by prisons, by hospitals, by marriage.
when i say queer i need to say it repetitively because our trans brothers and sisters are still getting murdered in the street.
when i say queer i need to say it repetitively so it sounds as heavy and urgent as it is.

when i say queer i need to say it loudly and unapologetically
because it is agony.
it is silence.
it is grief.
it is desire.
it is passion.
it is love.

資本生活中的矛盾是被經常過度簡略的挑戰。

我坐在roy street上的咖啡廳看著這莫名其妙的雨－－極快速地、四十五度傾斜、綿密的雨，而感到疲憊不堪。我目前的生活充滿著我應付不來的矛盾：和學校工友組織的勞工運動，革命者訓練，並一邊兼差幫一間支持戰爭的保守日裔美國人組織做數據管理的工作，你會非常驚訝他們可以籌到多少亞裔美國人的捐款！一週的下午全被會議的時間佔滿，即使搬來和L一起住，我們頂多只能在睡前一個小時好好說話，然後就是睡眠時間和在這資本主義社會下另一天的開始。媽媽的政治家學生的朋友在曼哈頓中央公園旁有一棟兩億的公寓，只是空著來招待朋友；而台北的房價炒到一坪八十五萬－－這樣的房子到底有誰可以買得起？！我身邊圍繞著比例相對高的勞工運動者，但一離開這個圈子，大多數的人還是迫不及待想要成為中產階級，考醫學院、唸MBA、上大型企業公司、競選民主黨的新星有色人種政治家、花六十萬去歐洲旅行。這對將要上博士班的我代表的是什麼呢？即是我拿的是比低收入戶還低的獎學金。也許學習去拿些生活中存在的這些矛盾是目前生存的必須。我只是想要有更多的時間建築我的感情和社群，並且更多在短期計畫之外的自由思考空間。我在清掃房子時發現去年買的鴻鴻的詩集《土製炸彈》，一直沒有時間好好讀，現在才發現原來這是一本不僅是反戰，並且是反帝國主義和反猶太復國主義的驚人詩集。我想這些看似過度簡單或草率的知識一直是存在我們的周圍，但有時候它的傳導力量和解析都比什麼薩伊德的東方主義還來得有力量多了。也是這些露骨或溫柔的文字一直督促著我學習的動力。我的焦慮總是在閱讀文學或者胡亂寫些日記後減輕許多。即使這雨還是他媽的奇怪地傾斜下著。