{"id":22932,"date":"2012-11-12T12:00:04","date_gmt":"2012-11-12T12:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=22932"},"modified":"2012-11-09T19:52:32","modified_gmt":"2012-11-09T19:52:32","slug":"banned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2012\/11\/banned\/","title":{"rendered":"Banned"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dedicated to the freedom and dignity of young men who choose to have boyfriends.<\/em><\/p>\n

In USA they were banned
\nto say truth in the army, as if
\nwhen they held rifles in illegal Iraq
\ntheir muscles would melt, as if
\nwhen they saw Qur’ans
\nin virulent Afghanistan
\nthey would set them alight.<\/p>\n

In Turkey where nature rises,
\ncracks the earth’s mundane stoned shell,
\nthey are ordered to bring photos
\nof their bare bodies with boyfriends,
\nto prove their arms and their legs
\ntheir designs and intent
\nshould not be admitted in armed uniforms.<\/p>\n

In India where one thousand films
\netched on celluloid each year,
\nthey are served the fame of shame
\nof dancing and singing to each other;
\nin a society where dream wedding sweaters
\nknit by uncles and aunties
\nwrap them with tight red buttons,
\nchoice is seldom, freedom 35mm.<\/p>\n

In Egypt where they touch
\nfingers and wrists, clothed chests and thighs
\nin streets, markets and parks
\nunder the veil
\nof brotherhood and friendship,
\nbehind coiled iron blockades
\nof intimacy and relationships,
\ntheir heartbeats of desire and heat
\ndrum unchecked.<\/p>\n

In Britain where few say
\n‘some people are so gay’,
\nlast month
\nI met Ryan my friend,
\nI still think of him.
\n____________________________<\/p>\n

Sumeet Grover:<\/em>
\n– Member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment<\/a> and of the TRANSCEND Art & Peace Network<\/a><\/em>
\n– Coordinator of Global Poetry<\/a><\/em>
\n– A software engineer originally from India, based in the UK.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dedicated to the freedom and dignity of young men who choose to have boyfriends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[182],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry-format"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22932\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}