It came to me in this safe space,

and it was a safe space,

that to stand in my own skin is to stand vulnerable,

always vulnerable, and I stood alongside the vulnerable,

the vulnerable and the brave…

for when I claim who I am,

when we claim who we are,

then I/ we don’t quite fit,

(but then I didn’t fit in the disguises I had concocted either),

We talked of edges,

of dancing on the edges,

but when you dance on the edge there is always the chance of a fall,

but then came the thoughts, one after another, maybe the edge is our centre,

and not an edge after all,

(what does that mean I wonder…)

do we need to be recentred?

we talked of being irritants, irritants produce pearls,

precious pearls in oyster shells,

so maybe we are a pearls of great price

worth more than we could have imagined….

we talked of desires,

of hopes,

of dreams,

and we sang…

we celebrated, but knew the journey, the fight, continues,

and there was a silence in that…

finally we prayed for those more vulnerable,

those whose identity puts their lives at risk

day after day…

we are one, diverse, wonderful, sparkling, determined…

Dolly Parton’s and Drag Queens,

we walk on in love…

looking for loves return…