after reading "poem about my rights," by june jordan

if i come for you
the wrong skin color
on the wrong day
the day when maybe your friends
thought you were someone else
a somebody maybe
who didn't hang around
with colors like me
if i come for you
and the sun shines brown on my round face
and my smile makes rise your sunset red
cheeks warm with blush
if i come for you
will the memory of my torso
arcing in a rainbow of earthtones
be enough
for you to defy your friends
and call me love
instead of enemy?

if i come for you
the wrong age
on the wrong day
the day when maybe you
wonder what your colleagues
or contrarily
your high school friends
might say
if i come for you
when you sit on your first legal barstool
if i come for you
when your son or daughter
graduates from elementary school
will you remember last night
we were both so young
that your teeth played hopscotch with my tongue?
will you introduce me as your student, teacher, neighbor, protégé
or the one who let your heart out of its cage?

if i come for you
the wrong gender
on the wrong day
the day when perhaps you were asking
for a promotion or a raise
the day when your father asks you
if you want to bring guests to christmas or thanksgiving or chanukah
the day when you're thinking of visiting your grandmother
or your five year old daughter
if i come for you
and my curves confuse your sense
of what's appropriate to talk about in the middle of the afternoon
if i come for you
and your heart becomes a red balloon
will you remember
that folks of my particular
gender aren't supposed to have that effect on you?
will you introduce me to your boss or your mother
as your friend or as your lover?

if i come for you
afterhours and after slipping past
polite conversation into the very particular
conditions of your unprecedented heart
after sliding the knife away from wrists
slick with the simplicity of death
and after the complicity of kisses
and slaughter of the solitary
of two bodies wrapped each individually
in cotton or polyester
tied up tight as birthday presents
after unpacking and tossing away the styrofoam peanuts
and cutting away the plastic and tape
or panties or boxers or whatever
you keep between
yourself and the rest of the world
to keep you safe
after the nervous bedsheets and the knotted telephone calls
after the disapproval of your mother
and all the former lovers
and other ghosts have hidden in the attic
for fear of the fire we started
in the bedroom/livingroom/kitchen
on the stair
after thinking beware loving too fast
and holding back too little
after giving up and giving in
to my easy grin
and my
tenderness
after tucking the doubts and fears into a locked box
and chucking them

if after all of this
if after the different politics--

if i come for you
the wrong color the wrong age the wrong gender
on the wrong day
on a day when you think maybe your friends or family or colleagues
might think they've got something to say
about someone as dark/light/old/young/male/female as me
will you look me in the heart
or will you turn away?

if i come for you, lover,
will you choose a universe preoccupied with uniform behavior
or a deviant like me who believes
that anyone could have the power
to set your heart free?