Blocked Path, Cisco, & Wilderness

Blocked Path

—

Cisco

I suppose if I hadn’t gone to piano lessons 
and sat at the bus stop in front of Matt’s house 
where you two played in his yard with his dog, 
you would not have come over and asked, 
“Why don’t you hike anymore?” 
You’re the one who joined Greg in the ambush 
to threaten me with crossbows for revealing 
his plan to cheat on a survivalist challenge. 
You two became hitmen, hitboys. 
You lay in wait for me to leave his door. 
If he had shot me, you would have shot me, too. 
My life would have ended, and so would yours. 

“It’s too dangerous,” I said, thinking about the rednecks 
who yelled, “What’s that n____r doing here?” 
when they saw me and Greg hike Big Tujunga Wash. 
We ran for our lives through the thicket as if we 
were runaway slaves and they were pattyrollers. 
I also thought about the innuendoes around me hiking 
with other boys. You kept us up half the night during 
the campout on the mountain, crying to go home. 
Did you fear I would molest you in your sleeping bag? 
Although nine years would pass before I came out, 
those incidents shocked me with the realization 
of the perils of being Black and queer in America. 

“It’s not that it’s too dangerous,” you said. 
“It’s just that you’re too cautious.” 
What do you know? Yeah, you’re brown, 
but you’re also straight. After those incidents, 
I could never relax when out in the wilderness. 
Doubly so for being queer. I’m always under watch. 
“If you’re not going to use your combat clothes, 
can I buy them?” you asked. I answered, “No.” 
I held onto my camouflage for twenty-four years 
before taking them to Worn Out West on Market Street 
in San Francisco (not Frisco or Cisco, like your name) 
and selling them on consignment as fetish wear. 

--

Wilderness 

Matt, I made a mistake 
when I asked you to help me assist 
that one-legged hiker up the creek. 
You told me you feared he would hit you 
because men had hit you before 
when they tried several times to kidnap you. 
I’m sorry. I believe you. 
It’s not your fault what happened; 
I shouldn’t have asked why 
the men wanted you. 
I knew why, 
and you knew why but couldn’t say. 

This is not an excuse. 
I was a wannabe Boy Scout, 
trying to do a good deed 
by helping a hiker in need. 
I thought you helping him 
would ease your fear of strangers. 
I can only imagine your horror 
to have to hold his clammy hand 
as he hobbled over slippery rocks. 
I didn’t know that you don’t 
overcome trauma by holding the hand 
of the man you fear will rape you. 

This is not an absolution. 
I never reported what you told me. 
I’ll never know if the kidnappers succeeded 
or if you told anyone else and got help. 
You begged to return home before dark. 
After we returned the one-legged hiker 
to the trailhead, the other boys on our hike 
turned on you and abandoned you. 
Tired and sore, you threatened to stay behind, 
but I wouldn’t let you. I urged you onward 
and walked you out of one of the many 
wildernesses you will encounter in life. 

This work was originally published in Beneath the Soil Volume iii, a collaborative zine featuring artwork from queer survivors of sexual violence.