potn by Jan Carroll

‘buttercup buds’

bloglog

Love this latest entry from Jan. Mysterious cosmic order, and a floaty quality (my favorite thing) especially on a morning when my mind is pathetically forensic.

later)

no luck with even remote focus, so spent the morning hatchetting away at my freezer iceover. I have the remaining fridge in Philly that takes defrosting. Course I love wielding the ax, and I was accompanied by Tchaikovsky on the radio, so I was imagining digging a potato out in Petrograd.

potd by Jan Carroll

‘Whitey wish’

bloggerdriller

The decision by the California Supreme Court to uphold Prop 8 and the uphold the validity of the 18,000 gay couples who were married before its passage, isn’t as schitzoid as it seems on the surface.

Chief Justice Ronald M. George wrote the opinion of the for a 6-to-1 majority, states that same-sex couples still had a right to civil unions, to “choose one’s life partner and enter with that person into a committed, officially recognized and protected family relationship that enjoys all of the constitutionally based incidents of marriage.”

George reinterates that that Proposition 8 did not “entirely repeal or abrogate” the right to such a protected relationship. It “carves out a narrow and limited exception to these state constitutional rights, reserving the official designation of the term ‘marriage’ for the union of opposite-sex couples as a matter of state constitutional law.”

That parameter points to what is essentially wrong about an ‘civil-union’ appropriation for gay couples. Separate is never equal. It’s possible that from the longterm goal of marriage equality rights, this technical loss will be turned into a decisive constitutional victory.

LOTD

“Just like the old days gay America is on its way to see the Supremes.” overheard at the modest anti-prop 8 rally at City Hall last night.

booksbooksbooks

I happened to be reading this passage from gay historian Martin Duberman’s new memoir ‘Waiting to Land’ when I heard that the Cal. Supremes upheld Prop 8 today. Martin’s entry revisits July 1, 1986, the day the US the Supreme Court decided Bowers v. Hardwick which gave states the right to police pivate relations between consenting gay adults. It was also a time when the Justice Department ruled that employers could fire people with AIDS.

“The best (and possibly only) comfort available at the moment is the ‘long view’-battles are inevitably lost along the route to progressive change. Still, it’s a rough moment.”

Keep the faith, babe.

Gay America responds

potd by Jan Carroll

A jitterbug wrapped in a lindy around a jive

Dive
Stomps
Scissor
over
my neck
flip fall
Arrest
Grind
Hold my eyes in your
Stare
Break out cyclone drug
drag
a gassed boil
Rolled down to a sweat drop
Bounce on the piston
To swing out
Basie’s One o’clock jump
On the downbeat
A riptide
floor slide
Between my legs
And back
The cramp recovers in the
Vaults
Flying Charleston
black bottoms
Rump rounds
pagopago
meringue
Tango dips
Tightass foxtrots and
There was one floras
Our heads rested
On each others necks
Our bodies jack-hammered
Over the dance hall
We signed the floor
Louie & Myra ‘43
A jitterbug
Wrappedinalindyaaaa
round a jive.

Politictictic

The Advocate is reporting that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is “pleased to announce that the Department of State will be extending a number of benefits and allowances to domestic partners of members of the Foreign Service assigned abroad.” Clinton says in her statement that it is “the right thing to do.”