Dear God, a Poem by PJ Quitoriano

Dear God, we won’t ask for forgiveness just because we are not straight.

My high school best friend is a lesbian. I got gay friends. My classmate is a bisexual. My idol in politics is a transgender, so am I.  That didn’t make us different, so Dear God, we won’t ask for forgiveness just because we are not straight.

They say we are sinners. they say we can never be somebody else someday. They say, we are a big disgrace to our families, they say we won’t be able to find a person who will love us unconditionally. Even though Dear God, we won’t ask for forgiveness just because we are not straight.

When I was young, I dreamt of becoming a beauty queen. Getting my mom’s dress and heels and wear it whenever they are not around. Well, it is hard for I am the only child of the family and my dad would want me to carry our surname. But they didn’t know that this supposed to be a son is actually a daughter. Dreaming that they will recognize my preference as a she and not a he. Like whenever we go to malls, I will be picking not a toy car but a barbie doll.

But my situation was totally different. I dreamt of a family of acceptance and love. A family which you can lean on and tell that hey, I like my seatmate. Nor my mom putting make up on my face and they will let me live and take the path I really wanted to be.

I have fell in love with a lot of guys, but most of them will tell me” I just wish you were a real woman.” But hell I am not! And I will never be. Every night, I imagine myself with my dream guy holding hands somewhere else and he will be proud that even if I am not straight, he loves me, we love each other and that matters most. Like looking up the skies and pointing at the stars. Differentiating if the one that is bright is either a star or a planet. Then I will tell him that he is the brightest of all the planets and he is my only star. But dang, I just hope it won’t remain as a dream.

Why can’t Aladdin love Prince Charming? Why can’t Cinderella love Snow White? Why can’t we love a person with the same sex and live happily ever after? We were not only created just for the sake of bearing offspring, but to love. So bring back the value of humanity. Because that is what we are lacking.

I am afraid that one day, no one will love me because of who I am. Still dear god, I won’t ask for forgiveness just because I am not straight.

The closet I have been hiding for so long is no longer a comfortable place. Can you imagine changing attitude and changing the way you act in front of your parents and your family? There is a point when I thought of taking away my life. That I don’t know what to do. But I realized that I am too beautiful to die.

That I can’t even talk straight to my parents for I want to come out. I want to come out in this cage I have been for so so long. I hate to feel I am not accepted. I hate to feel I am not loved. Who would want it either?

But still Dear God, I won’t ask for forgiveness just because I am not straight.

This is just one of the many cases that involves homosexuality in my country. But there are more cases that are worse than mine. There are those who just went away from their homes for they felt it is no longer home. There are those who have been killed by their loved ones because of stereotyping. There are those who still are on their closets and everyday, they feel the depression. I am sad for this world. I am sad for this society I am in too.

But Dear God, we won’t ask for forgiveness just because we are not straight.

Holy are those who are not sinners. Holy are those who think that we don’t have a place in this world. And holy are those who cannot accept us. But either way, my friend once told me “Don’t beg for acceptance”. God already did it for them.

To all of you. To all the straight people out there, we are not your bank accounts that whenever you want to buy food to feed yourselves, you call us. Or when you want new clothes, we are just there. And when you don’t have money, you text again. We are not your one night stand. We deserve more than that. We deserve more the love before and after it.  Also, tell your kids not to tease us whenever we walk on the streets. Teach them that we also deserve to be respected. And tell them that it isn’t bad to be homosexual as long as they don’t hurt anybody.

If only we could force ourselves to be straight, then we have done that long before. But that is the path we want to take. Someday, we will show you that without us, this world won’t be as colorful as it is. Because we are your rainbows after the rain and storm. We are not just stage decorators and entertainers, We will be your president, we will be your lawyers, we will be doctors, and we will be somebody someday.

To all the LGBTQI + members out there, the fight still continues. Continue fighting for a world of people who accept us and not just tolerating us. We are not suppose to fight but this world wants us to. Continue fighting a world of equality. And make our dreams into reality.

I am not asking for gifts like Iphones, laptops, money or any material things in this world, all I want is for us to be loved, to be accepted, for people to have compassion and care. We need people to be open minded. A man is for a woman, and a woman is for a man they say. But no! A human is for a human. No scripture or religion, or beliefs or whatever can stop us from loving and existing in this world. We are also humans like you.

So Dear God, we ask for forgiveness for we are sinners not because of being members of the LGBT community. Tthank you for you are there in our battles.

And lastly dear God, enlighten them.

Written by  PJ Quitoriano, a 2017-2018 Global UGRAD student studying at Augustana University