I practice punching at the kitchen table. I practice on the couch. I practice in my sleep. I make a fist and see my life there. I make a fist and study the veins that press out against the skin of my forearms. Hating your hate of love, I practice punching at the kitchen table.

 July, 2015

A neighbor invited me over for dinner, and being new to the area, I went with excitement at the prospect of a new friend. He was quite the comedian, and we were two drinks in after a lovely dinner filled with laughter when he directed the conversation to same-sex marriage. My stomach sank as I realized he hoped to continue with his comedy skit.

 He expressed his disbelief and horror that the U.S. Supreme Court recently struck down all state bans on same-sex marriage, legalized it in all fifty states, required states to honor out-of-state same-sex marriage licenses, and then to my horror, he spent the next fifteen minutes discussing dog breeds – and which ones would be best to unleash on the gays.

 Pulling up pictures on his phone, he clearly articulated the characteristics that would best allow each dog to chase down and kill its human target (though not human to him). He preached on which breeds could be properly trained to hunt down the homosexuals and rip out their throats.

 I placed myself thoroughly back in the closet, smiled, nodded, laughed, and felt entirely empty. Cold. Wrong. Then I made my friendly excuses, agreed we’d need to do dinner again soon to avoid any suspicion, and walked home looking over my shoulder every five steps. I couldn’t remember which breeds he identified, too focused on the images of sharp teeth and well-muscled necks; too focused on the fact that skin – and life – is so easily ripped apart.

 In fear, I make a fist and see my life there. While I just want to love who I will, my heritage is built on the balancing of hate and so my blood runs thick with rage, with joy, with their tender twisting, competing, contradicting, so that a love of hate rises in my own pulse with the power of perceived necessity. You hate my love. You force me to walk in fear. And so, I make a fist and see my life there.

 June, 2019

My girlfriend called in tears this afternoon. Out for a skate with some friends, enjoying the bright day, dry sidewalks, and gentle breeze, they encountered a man who felt the need to spit on them as they passed by and scream his slurs. The frustration ripped her voice raw on the phone, and I could provide no answers to her repeated question: WHY?

Feeling the angst of helplessness, and uncertainty, and wrongness in my own skin, I decided to go for an evening jog. Along the river, the warm sun gently baked my bare shoulders and I internalized some of its warmth. But the sun’s reflection on the water was a bit too bright, so I returned home another way, passing the out-of-towners by the monuments.

I’d decided to wear a rainbow for the jog – opened my drawer, saw the shirt, and put it on wanting to support my girlfriend, support our queerness; wanting to embrace my love, embrace myself. But to some, a rainbow is a bullseye, a place to direct one’s anger – and a reason to direct it too. I ran right into a crowd of young men (or perhaps just boys who have never truly loved) who decided to articulate their disapproval of my existence. Luckily, my long legs carried me through, and my agility proved itself when one boy slung out his leg in an attempt to trip me and force a meeting between my skin and the asphalt.

Blood pumping and energized by my anger, by my hate of their hate, my legs took me up the final hill and back home with a speed I’d never managed to muster before. I paced my apartment rather than stretch, pondering at what point I’d act, at what point I’d kick back. Then my exhaustion hit and I simply sat down deflated. I doubted those boys had ever known love in adversity, but perhaps even more importantly, maybe they’d never lost love.

I make a fist and see my life there. But then I pause, release, breathe, lay down my hand and let it rest on the kitchen table beside the gentle whorls of woodgrain. I study the stillness and the weight of reality hits as I see how my narrow fingers and veins running the lengths of my forearms would look if I took it too far – how they’d look in the stony stillness of death.

November, 2022

I will forever remember that weightlessness, that dizziness, that chill to the bones, that hollow feeling that came when I read the headline and delved into the details of the Q Nightclub tragedy. Not the first, not the last, but again to see the slurs, the spit, the swings we so often dodge amplified to this level of planned violence with the intent to kill – I was struck dumb. I was left to reflect on how the numbness and disbelief so easily transforms to our own rage, anger, and hate.

The Colorado Springs gunman was taught to see us as abominations. In his soil was planted fear, meant to flower into disgust and hate so that his sense of right and wrong became twisted like purple vines meant to suffocate, and we became something other than human. Emboldened by the bible and abhorrence, he acted with the hate rooted in his heart – something that someone else put there, and then another amplified, and another, and another until the practice of hate became his light, his religion, his purpose. In many ways, they are all the same, claiming that we degrade and decay American greatness, go against the natural God-given order of life. Too often the tools they claim to enable one’s right to self-defense are so blatantly misused as a “right” to offense. The bible loving bigots have a perverted way of “loving thy neighbor.”

Unfortunately, Colorado Springs gunman will never be made to feel ashamed for his lack of love, for his efforts to suffocate, strangle, snuff out our light. He will be honored as a hero, someone willing to do what must be done. When the clear lines we know never to cross are ignored by those who hate you, they can so easily disappear from our own awareness too. And what then? Where does that leave us? It leaves us again attempting to balance our life and our love with the unfairness of our unchosen heritage of hate. But I’m slowly learning that, when balanced, we are able to carry even the heaviest of loads, with backs straight, with chins up. And, when balanced, even with fear, we can exist day by day just by being ourselves.

I hate your hate of love, but now I realize your hate of love makes my life powerful. So much energy is lost while harboring anger and hating you back. While I may practice punching, I’ll think of your reaction as I hug rather than hit, and I’ll focus on living and loving loudly. Yes, I’ll build my strength, and vigilance must remain, and I will be ready. But I’m learning that I don’t need to hold my anger waiting for the next punch anymore because just being I hit like a heavy hammer.

Chris Biles

Chris Biles is a queer writer/artist currently living and working in Washington D.C. She enjoys playing with the light and the dark, and losing herself in music, anything outside, and some words here and there. Chris was a finalist in the 2022 and 2023 DC Poet Project and is published by Neon Door, Bourgeon Online, Exeter Publishing, Evening Street Review, Haunted Waters Press, Yellow Arrow Publishing, Signatures Magazine, FleasOnTheDog, Another New Calligraphy, and others. You can find her at marks-in-the-sand.com / Instagram: @marks.in.the.sand