During the campaign for California's Proposition 22 to ban gay marriages, my dear friend and former roommate, Clay Whitmer, and his best friend, Stuart Matis, both committed suicide. The hateful lobbying for this proposition caused them great pain in the weeks before they took their own lives.

On Thursday morning, I was elated to hear that the mostly Republican-appointed justices had ruled that the ban on gay marriages was unconstitutional. After my initial euphoria, I decided to write a tribute and this is the working copy.



In re MARRIAGE CASES
California Supreme Court
5/15/08

-- For Clay and Stuart. Both of them left this life too soon
because they just could not take the hate anymore.


I would have
called Clay
right away.
He would have
cried with relief
shouted with joy
blurted out a catty
comment or two.
Then, he would have
called Stuart to celebrate.

Clay hasn't had
a phone number for
nearly eight years.

He left his number
and his pain behind
when he bought a gun,
and rode the city bus to
The Presidio.

I imagine he
found just the
right spot before
breathing one last
huge sigh of relief
one last blink before
he ended the pain
in a flash of light.

Sometimes,
good news
comes too late
making victory
bittersweet.

When will the bricks
of judgment cease to fall
on all the innocent souls?

TRIBUTE TO THE NFL

Helmeted warriors
lined up
shoulder-to-shoulder,
frozen in coiled stances
determined by position.

Statues of rock-hard flesh,
they crouch face-to-face,
breathing fire and smoke
across a thin, intense, scrimmage
line of crackling air which
narrowly divides the bellowing
Bills and Browns who paw the grass
as they wait for the QB
to make the call.

After the snap,
warriors collide
on the white-lined,
green battlefield.
Sweaty smoke wafts
over the field
of pounding flesh
and piston tendons as
Vikings and Buccaneers
seek to steal the small,
brown ball of treasure.

War with minimal casualties,
men on a complex mission,
special forces dominating the field,
massive hits in the trenches
peopled by Packers and Steelers.

Patriots and Raiders exchange
grenades of passion, of fanaticism,
that explode in the battle
To Protect vs. To Sack
the Quarterback King.

Yet we get a ballet passing game,
complete with men in tight, shiny, pants--
aerial acrobats, sure-handed
contortionists defying gravity--
who catch pigskin missiles
fired from rocket arms.

Jaguar cornerbacks stalk
sleek Panther receivers.
Air battles ensue between
high-flying Falcons and Eagles
while Seahawks stun Ravens
with mid-air miracles,
and Saints flutter right by Jets
propelled by high-octane breaths.

Some of these men
are mountains, true Titans,
Giants in the midst of battle
when they clash in movable,
x and o coach-scripted trenches.
Crashing helmets create thunder
as Cardinals and 49ers see red all around
and Chargers and Rams collide
in bone-crunching bursts.

Texans and Cowboys shoot it out,
then try to tame kicking Colts and Broncos--
stallions battling for the right to lead
the herd to Super-hallowed ground.
Meanwhile, Chiefs and Redskins
struggle for tribal supremacy,
and Dolphins surf the waves
of cacophonic crowd surges.

Because of The Rules
the Zebras are able
to keep order among
the Lions and Bengals and Bears
and all other beasts on the field.

Some call it fast chess,
some never know what hit them,
their primal screams drowned out
by the crowd of basic instincts.