John Dossey
to act is to be real
and wave your hands, showing the
world how real you are
to act is to have others who are
willing to be real alongside
you, waving and screaming
“we are here, we are here
and we are many in numbers”
and we wave, and we shout
we are real, we exist,
and this advances us
but at what cost?
i act as i sit and watch and
exist
i act by living in a world that
hates me
my fear is not of ridicule,
for of that i have had plenty
my fear is not of words,
for those are misinterpreted
and faulty communication
no, my fear is of death
and of becoming the next
“his name was” trend
i am more than a name
i am more than my body,
which is misinterpreted
even more than my words
i act by existence,
my screams are real
and my chains creak under my strength
no, you need not write
“his name was john”
for my legacy is more than a name
i act by existing
and for that i may have my existence stolen
for simply daring to walk the street
with the body i was born in
and the mind that is my own
the mind that screams deafeningly loudly
against unhearing ears
to act is to live,
to subsist
but to subsist is to be seen
with broken and scratched lenses
by a world who wants us to go
away
to act is to be real,
to be alive
to live
and to live is to die
but death mustn’t be so bad
after all,
only those who existed once
have a chance to
unexist