Love is Love
Akshita is a nineteen year old overachiever and perfectionist with big dreams, trying to wade through her entangled teenage years. An extrovert, dog lover and travel enthusiast who finds her ultimate home in the poems she can create at any given time of the day.
LOVE is LOVE
-Akshita
I do not remember
the grade I was in
when I learnt-
(i) love = between man and woman
(ii) gender = male and female
(iii) sexuality= gender;
equations so grossly inaccurate
that now it pains me
how all my teachers loved
their algebra so much that
none of them bothered
to strike them off, cancel my test
and give me a dressing down
for messing this up.
I wish they’d done it;
it would’ve made me
an excellent human
rather than just an excellent scholar
who crumbled at the sight
of homophobia,
as soon as she entered the real world.
I still remember the first time
my friends made fun
of a boy in tenth grade
because he ‘walked like a woman’
and looked ‘so gay’.
I did not say anything, didn’t feel anything,
but I saw the boy
contract in himself,
as if trying to pack his existence
inside an invisibility cloak,
as if rebuking himself for
trying to be himself,
as if trying to say sorry
for existing.
It breaks me to recall
the number of times
I saw homophobic jokes
fly in the sky above me
like balloons,
and I just watched
like a mute spectator,
marveling at the sight,
unaware of the pressures
surrounding the balloons,
unaware of how snarky comments
could lead to identity crises,
demolished self-esteems
and make perfect, confident, loving human beings
ashamed of themselves.
It’s awful what we’ve done to them
through inhuman treatment, mean jokes
and heartless comments;
we’ve pushed them so hard
that they had to leave
and form a new community,
to reaffirm their identities,
to find love, care and belongingness,
to reinstate their rights as humans.
But I still don’t understand
why we let genitals, sexual preferences,
ways of dressing, eating, talking and walking
overshadow ability, talent,
compassion, affection and humanity?
Why do we obsessively police
boys kissing boys,
girls kissing girls,
both kissing both?
Why can’t we just leave them alone?
For once, imagine the number of rainbows
the sky would produce
the day we all decide to embrace
identities just as they are,
imagine the amount of love
filling the streets
the day we all decide to chant
‘love is love’,
imagine the warm and accepting world
we would help create
the day we all give up
our homophobic thought process.
The views expressed are that of writer.