Morning

A truly beautiful morning out.

I have to remember, beauty is a perception. A feeling, an interpretation of what is.

Got out of bed when the alarm went off. Was holding my love, warm in his embrace. Curled up into him.

I cant say I was fully asleep. Only in that part of dreamland where awake impressions seem to blend with the dark of sleep. He was also there, and clinging to me as much as I was clinging to him.

He asked me to stay. It was tempting. Warm bed, warm body, enveloping love that seems to flow skin to skin, one soul in the other immersed. I wanted to stay, but did not. There’s a siren call in my veins, the dawn beckons like a warm fire. That time of day, when night becomes light, and darkness slips away softly, lightly, definitely.

I held him, told him that I did love him, and told him I had to go out.

The veranda.

Dawn comes later. Darkness still is past six these days. I stared out, and started to write. Quickly, unseeing, a poem flowing from the mind to the page with only the occasional hesitancy, gap of thought for a word. I have found my voice.

Don’t know whether it is the rainy season or not. The seasons seem un-seasonal to me. But the dawn was brilliant, as promised. Yet there was this grey cloud cover revealed as the sun strengthened. Sun strength in the very first few seconds promised a day of brilliant light. But it was eclipsed, within minutes, the sun slipped under the clouds. And though light, it is the bright light of a winter day in colder climates.

Though, this being Uganda, it is much warmer.

I may have a woollen sock pulled over my head, but that is because I had it shaved yesterday. It is beautiful drizzly weather outside. Not too cold, not too warm, just cold enough to be bracing in the early morning.

I have lots to do. So do you, I believe.

I have not touched or read the news of the world, for suddenly, I find that there is so much of me wrapped in the world around me that I am content. What is happening in America or New Zealand is interesting. But suddenly, to a news guzzler like me, it is not so important as the state of the morning, and the sudden bloom of hope in my mind.

I was thinking of Africa. Mother Africa, as I think of her.

Suddenly, to me, seems as if I can see her beauty in spite of the tears of pain, hope in the face of despair.

The whole wide world is my heritage. I will not reject it. I will not reject any part of it. Rather, I will embrace its enveloping hug.

Hope. 3 months ago, I was fearful that I had lost my job, because I had tied myself to the gay cause. I hung on, literally by the skin of my teeth.

I am gay. A fact. Bitter for some people, yes. Just as the colour of my skin does signify a defect to some, as does my ancestry. Yet I am human. A guy, a member of a religion I maligned, thinking that it was persecuting me, a human being like me, stood for what he believed. He knew, knows or believes that I am gay. A homosexual. We have not discussed it, a grey area of knowledge we seem to skirt.

That knowledge has not made him reject me, though others did do so. Did not stop him from holding out a life line of hope for my job.

Now, suddenly, circumstances are changed. And I seem to be back in favour. Known, or at least believed gay, but still capable of doing the work that I have been doing all these years.

One man’s courage, and faith in another human being.

The dust is barely settled, but I may stir it up again. Soon.

I asked why do I continue in this risk taking that can injure me?

Because I am a human being. Because hope blooms eternal, a flower of love and beauty in my heart. Because I am a human being, and no lesser, and no better than many others. Because I dare to believe in myself.

Believe in yourself. What an interesting thought. Faith in what I am.

Have a wonderful day.

GayUganda