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Ode to Coming Out — another poem
He finally loved her and set her free into the world, a lady no longer afraid.
Three cheers, maybe more with
closet doors open, or was it prison doors?
Freedom for him, freedom for her,
she, incarcerated in his body in the closet.
The Marginalized and Allies cheer and yell,
“a woman is born, so beautiful, so brave, so strong.
The man in the closet, no longer there,
sacrificed masculinity, not by choice.
She demanded it!
Too many years of longing and pain.
She never hated him,
She kept him alive.
Fifty long years, acceptance the key
that opened the door.
A self-imposed sentence,
unjust and unfair.
Stigma, Judgement, Hatred,
the bars that they feared the most.
She emerged, the lady,
who was in the closet no more.
He finally loved her and set her free
into a world, a lady, no longer afraid.
Three cheers and many more
for the lady who finally came out.
Patsy Starke, 3/3/2025
