They want Pride to be pretty.
Pastel.
Palatable.
Profitable.
They want our rainbows to end firmly in the black.
They want our glitter to forget it came from ash.
But Pride—
Pride was born in a bar
where the floor was sticky with spilled drinks
and spit from the mouths of cops who kicked first
and asked later.
Pride started when Marsha threw a brick,
when Sylvia lit a match,
when the queens locked arms and said,
“Not today.”
Pride was not a parade.
It was a riot.
A reckoning.
It was mascara smeared with tear gas,
lace gloves soaked in sweat and blood,
heels dug into pavement like a protest.
It was the sound of doors kicked open
and closets burned down behind us.
But they forget.
Or worse—they rewrite.
They take our history, bleach it in boardrooms,
slap rainbows on receipts,
make “Love is Love” into a catchphrase
instead of a war cry.
They forget the funerals without families,
the lovers who weren’t allowed to say goodbye,
the ACT UP chants that echoed through hospital halls
where our people died waiting for the world to care.
And yet—
We dance.
God, we dance.
We vogue in the face of legislation.
We kiss like rebellion under courthouse steps.
We sashay into towns where they told us to be quiet
and we crank the volume until our joy
breaks windows.
This isn’t just Pride.
It’s survival in stilettos.
It’s every “faggot” screamed on a playground
turned into a battle cry on a stage.
It’s drag queens raising generations
with duct tape and devotion.
It’s trans girls in truck stops
who still paint their nails.
It’s every queer elder who made it long enough
to watch us shine.
So no—
I will not shrink.
I will not soften the edges of this rainbow
so it fits with your logo.
I am here
because someone bled.
Because someone burned.
Because someone loved themselves
even when the world said they shouldn’t.
This is not your party.
This is our resurrection.
And we’re just getting started.
