National Coming Out Day 1998

by Bryan Borland

As a sophomore I skipped my classes,
hid in my dorm-room closet, lived on warm soda

and stale crackers and pissed in a cup
instead of walking down the hallway

or across campus, instead of making
myself an easy target for sniper glances

of categorical identification as deadly as a bullet
to my Southern-Baptist chest. For twelve hours

of daylight, I stood mute, a boy fearful
of the monsters under his creaking bed,

of judgmental angels with letterman jackets,
of firing squad congregations, without even

a glimmer in the warzone of a miseducated brain
that one day, I’d feel autumn on my shirtless skin.

© Bryan Borland