what i want

Jun 27, 2021 | 2018 Winter - What I Want, Poetry

By Courtney Carola

i want
to be accepted
for who i am
to be understood
or at least respected
i want
to not live in fear
of just being me
to not have to justify myself
to everyone who comes near
i want
to see others like me
on tv or in books
to see others like me
living a life so happy
i want
the next generation
to have everything i didn’t
to live a life without hate
without abuse or deprecation
i want
a change
or at least for things to improve
so that being queer
won’t be seen as so strange

By day, Courtney Carola is a 23-year-old college student, high school librarian, and indie author. By night, she fights against bi erasure and for bi visibility.

Related Articles

Love Punch

By Jennie Harper I was 39 when I learned how to make a proper fist. “I know,” I protested as my date adjusted my hand. “The thumb goes on the outside.” But my father only passed down part of the protection. The thumb must also wrap around the middle bar of knuckles,...

read more

Imbalances

By Sara Collie I am 10 or 11, navigating some pre-teen cusp of selfhood when the question rises up, engulfs me, troubling that long sunstroked lunch outside the Cornish pub under the looming cliffs where I watch the waitress tuck her hair neatly behind her ears,...

read more