The Quiet, Gentle, Comfort and Strength of a Butch

The Quiet, Gentle, Comfort and Strength of a Butch

To be extracted from the world of heteronormativity, and nursed in to the realization of who you truly are is worth weeping, and struggling in happiness about. The confusing nature of coming out to yourself in a world that wants you to be “normal”, to succumb to the ideas of how we all should act is powerful and an act of rebellion, whether you are the confrontational type or not. Whether you see yourself fighting on the front lines, or holding the hands of those we love in times of stabbing, uncomfortable questions and long held beliefs.

Oh my lovely Butch, watching you walk down those sidewalks, strong arms, strong legs, strong heart, strong mind. The knowledge you carry in each breath, each glance, each touch. To have those fingers grace my skin, kiss my mind and my soul. I am the lucky one. I hear, I feel people question who you are, how you live, how you are you. To tell you, that you are beautiful will never be enough, because the world always puts that into question. I hope it is enough to know that I know you are handsome.

The tears i have cried for you, and then selfishly myself thinking about a world without you in it. What a nightmare that would be. I hear your story in text from other books, glimpses of scenes of movies, never long enough bring flashback to truths you hold.

Secrets that you’ll perhaps never share. That I can feel.

Hearing those strong boots stomp down the hall brings flutters to my heart. Your scent of cologne and those strong determined eyes. It belongs to you, to every butch that graces this planet. It belongs to your individual. You do you, so damn well.

Hold that door open for me, not because I need you to, but because you know I have better things to do.

Holding your hand, oh that feeling of holding your hand as we pass an unforgiving (pair of) eye(s). Let me touch those callused fingers. How I make your chest lift each time I place my soft lips on yours. The rush, oh my heart each time you make love to me. No other has ever made me feel.

I know that our time is short, perhaps shorter than we know, depends on our safety I suppose. I can hear others tell me to not think that way, but that is an unfair request. When the world we live in demands me to question your safety, whether you’ll come home to me each time you step outside of that damn door. How I wish we could just stay as safe as I feel when I’m in your room. In your sheets, in your arms. Your smell is traced in and around, out and back in again in my mind. Feels like home. It is home. Hold me in those strong arms, but let those strong butch walls come down for a while so that i may feel the soft beating of your heart. The care that you hold for each and every woman in each breath. Each time that we lay together it’s as if the scars of the day, the week, the month, and the year are patched up for a while. Till you or I must go to work.

Others may not understand how we live, how we work. Oh baby do we work. Shifting and changing each day, our parts never seem to fail connection. Something I know many people will never know, never feel. Is it selfish of me to laugh? Laughter feels good around you. You make my laughter travel, carry. Even in times that I may want to cry you bring that smile up to the surface.

People complain about the smoke from forest fires, the fog that covers the hills. How they want that clear sky and air. I get that rarely, and always when I am with you.

 

“Sing me no songs of daylight,

For the sun is the enemy of lovers

Sing instead of shadows and darkness,

And memories of midnight.” -Sappho

Sincerely,

Ali Tucker

 

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