Queers Write Anthology
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Index
The You Not You by Avi Ben-Zeev
Our soft animal body by Alex Thurley-Ratcliff
There are no similes for pink by Alex Thurley-Ratcliff
Red red eyes by Christina Osborne
Nell Ruell Goes to Hell (excerpt) by RJ Driscoll
The Kindness of London by Caprice May
The lighthouse by Marianne Lynch
Undisturbed by Lynsay Mackay
Wishes by Lynsay Mackay
Can a dragon eat a rice cooker? by Lynsay Mackay
The Price by Lynsay Mackay
Deliverance by Tray Morgan
Queer V&A by Erika Niesner
A Diverse Bunch by Caprice May
A love letter to Queer Write by Paul Taylor-Pitt
Please read and enjoy! Note, too, all works are the copyright of their authors.
The You Not You
by
Avi Ben-Zeev
September 18th, San Francisco, USA
“She’s gone,” my brother whispers into the phone, over 7000 miles away.
There’s no time to feel. Orthodox Jewish custom in Israel dictates that the body, your body, be buried in forty-eight hours or less. No exception. “If not, the spirit becomes trapped between worlds,” the Rabbi from Chevra Kadisha explains, as though he knows what happens after death.
“Hurry,” Gil urges, but easier said than done, what with my job, finding a dog sitter, and where was I? Ah, yes, hurry. I must make it to your funeral, Mom, my ima or,
no, there’s no other option.
To-do items crossed off my list in a frenzied haze; I grab an Uber to the airport. The driver slaloms up and down San Francisco’s steep hilly streets, passing a trolley with waiving tourists flashing toothy smiles. How dare the sky be blue, with no infamous fog in sight?
“See? We’ve made record speed.” The driver comes to a full stop in front of Departures. “I’ll give you five stars,” I say and dash inside, my heart whoosh whoosh whooshing in my ears. Will I clear the scanner this time without delay?
“Step aside,” the TSA officer orders, his upper lip curled. It’s the scanner. Must be; my body defies its settings.
A few questions into the interrogation, my name is announced on the PA system –the final boarding call. I repeat, proceed immediately to your gate, the disembodied voice commands. “Go,” the officer huffs, and I sprint faster than I thought I knew how.
The plane greets me with hissing air vents and hospital-beige fold-out trays. My seat belt, gray and slick, clicks tightly into place, squeezing my thighs. The familiar is real but not; a facsimile of a world that once had you in it.
I can’t write you a eulogy yet, but I brought a memento for inspiration—a studio photograph of us.
Look, Mom, my ima, there’s six-year-old me, pigtailed and made to wear a dress, and look, there’s you, hiding behind me, shaking from phen-fen—anything to lose weight.
“What do you want to be when you grow up, little girl?” The photographer asked.
“A bull,” I said.
“A heifer? How come?” you asked, your brow deepening its creases. You didn’t expect me to become a doctor or a lawyer, but trans-species? Definitely not.
“I love to play in the mud,” I said, and we laughed, ruining the photographer’s meticulous staging.
I love, no, I loved your unarmed rolling laughter, how you kept your promises, and, yes, it took you a while, but you called me son.
Only seven hours after your death, memory is already growing your wings, dulling the sharpness of your horns, smoothing wrinkles, and covering liver spots—forcing a monument to motherhood constructed from the glossy marble of a tombstone.
No, I refuse the mind’s propensity to lie outright.
Air pockets—a bumpy ride—and I’m holding on to my bovine childhood wish for dear life.
Mom, my ima, I want, no, I need to keep you gloriously messy.
The muck. I want the muck.
September 21st, Herzliya Cemetery, Israel.
Damp and breathless, I join the procession already in motion—your shrunken, child-sized remains on a gurney, bouncing up and down to the melancholy sounds of the Rabbi’s prayer.
Gil waves me to the front of the line, and we follow the you-not-you, wrapped in a white cotton shroud. Liar, I scream, no sound coming out of my throat, just my brow’s sweat on my tongue. Liar. You swore that dying wasn’t in your plans anytime soon.
Forty degrees Celsius and humid, Gil and I persevere on the pebbly path that twists and turns, the thin Poplar trees trying but failing to provide relief from an unrelenting sun.
“We’ve arrived,” the Rabbi announces, and we halt at
your open grave, your final resting spot.
“For you were made from dust, and to dust you will return,” the Rabbi chants, and the strangers with the yarmulkes and pe’ot hover the gurney over a casket-less hole in the ground. A naked cavity. Then the men tilt the gurney, and, no, this piercing pain in my chest, I can’t look.
A thudding of stiff meat and dry bones,
a smell of brambles, must, and moss,
and now I do look, eyes stinging like bees,
a body disappearing under layers of shoveled earth.
I finally get it.
You will never return.
October 3rd, Yom Kippur, San Francisco, USA.
Of all places, here I am—Synagogue on Yom Kippur. I know, strange for a non-believer.
An ancestral calling? A homing instinct? All I know is that I’m wearing white on this Day of Atonement like you did after Grandpa Simcha died.
Far away from the home I’ve rejected, I look for glimpses of you in the Semitic faces of Diaspora Jews clad in ghostly attires. Greedy, I bargain with the god I don’t believe in to bring you back for one stolen moment.
Stay strong, you whisper, but I could use some caretaking, a hug. I’d even hire one of those cuddling professionals—a no-nonsense lady, big-boned and buxom, who’d open her arms. “Come here,” she’d say, squeezing me so hard I’d be forced to surrender.
This woman, well, she might look like you, but you rarely hugged me, and when you did, you arched your back, avoiding pressing your breasts against my unruly buds.
“You were an unhuggable kid,” you said when I confronted you about the lack of physical affection, and I chose to believe you.
I chose to believe that some babies, like me, are born wrong.
Forgive, forgive, you say from the beyond, an absolution, request, maybe both.
You, who I miss so much, pain threatens to turn into numbness.
You, who are slipping away, morphing against my will.
***
Avi Ben-Zeev is a London-based American gay trans man, high school failure, and Yale Ph.D. As a writer, psychologist, and immigrant, he explores the challenges and freedoms of journeying toward belonging and home. Avi’s stories won the 2024 London Independent Story Prize (LISP) and the UK’s first transgender writing competition. He was shortlisted and highly commended by the 2023 Oxford Flash Fiction Prize, and his co-edited anthology, Trans Homo, was a Lambda Literary Award Finalist. Avi’s literary memoir, Calling My Deadname Home, was recently published by Muswell Press. Find out more at www.avibenzeev.com.
“The You, Not You” was shortlisted and highly commended by the 2023 Oxford Flash Fiction Prize and published in Flashy Gifts: An Oxford Flash Fiction Prize Anthology.
abenzeev@icloud.comOur soft animal body
Inspired by Mary Oliver’s poem, Wild Geese, “you only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves”
I’m your catspaw, dogsbody, wolf boy, bear cub
I’m fur and gristled bone
Blood and teeth ripping your heart apart
Deep down, growl howl
Blood thud and talon click on the
Stony, icy ground outside.
Coming for you, blood humming for you
Sniffing out your hiding and your hidden places
Under the bed, behind the door
Terrified eyes, under the floor
What are you hiding and where?
I’ll rake it all up with my sweet claws
You can run, but you can’t
Hide
Go on… you can run.
Please run… it’s how I get my kicks
Dose me up, knock me out
Don’t let my creature out
I’ll bite and scratch like a demon
I’m that ancient cursed beast
I’m 666 on day release
And I’m coming for you – at last
I’m coming for you – fast
I’m all caught up with your guilty, filthy past
So once we meet
I’ll see you
Real and undivided
I’ll be your darkest secret
And your wide open face.
There are no similes for pink
There are no similes for pink
It’s not red raw, blood red
Not virgin white and moonlight
It’s not a binary - it lies between
I found it in a kiss and my soft heart
In the gentlest of flowers and a gutsy punk hair do
Or where the sea and sky meet at dusk on a holiday island
And later at night the strobing disco lights, or a dancer’s tutu
It’s Angel Delight or a triangle on a grey grey uniform
It’s my Doc Martens as a I dance along the street or kick your sorry ass.
That time in Wales
It was the dots on my swimming trunks
The sea-blown herbs, clover and thistle,
Vetch and ling and sea shells
The electric café signs and strawberry ice
Bright as the punchy neon briefs
Which Barry, from Barry, revealed that day
In heartfelt, yet hidden, allegiance
As we lay in the marram-lined sand dunes
Listening to nothing
Leaving me
with a colourful rash from the sea thistles
And the memory
of his soft mouth
and my
tired
heart.
***
by Christina Osborne
15 April 2024
In a far away land, it seems like years ago. I used to wake up to the radiant glow of your body.
I’d lie, wake up, ever the morning person. I’d gently slip out of bed and you would pretend to be unaware of my presence.
I can still see you in the floral chair, the cat on your lap. A morning kiss. Like the sun on morning dew. A promise of things to come.
You would have a slow start, and then burst into life when it was time to leave. Boots laced, dog on leash, enthusiastically waiting.
Walking, walking, walking until our legs were sore and our feet blistered. Coffee, holding hands, and then off again. You in front, scowling at me as I stopped to take a photograph with my silver camera.
Back home. That warm and welcoming fragrance that hit as we entered. You made the old lady’s house beautiful.
I didn’t see you slipping away, spirit broken.
Reinvented, alone.
Retribution. Harm. Dignity. Mistrust. Price. Revenge.
Accusations and lies.
Red, red eyes.
An extract from Nell Ruell Goes to Hell
A dark fantasy novel by R.J. Driscoll
Nell’s fingertips brushed her own reflection in the mirror, thumbing at the
gold speckles inside her left iris. Those faint smidges of pigment were the
only riches she’d ever possessed. Jack used to call them Nell's dowry.
Ursula said they'd make a fine token, one that would help her strike a deal
with the literal devil. If she survived her crazy ordeal, she'd have to
learn how to live without them. What then? Would her left eye feel forever
naked?
Of course, she could die trying to get to Satan, and all this wondering
would have been nothing but a waste of precious time.
"What are you doing, Miss Ruell?"
Turnball's voice sounded far away, as if the governess were shouting at
Nell from a distant shore.
A jolt of electricity ran to Nell's fingertips, where they met the glass.
It shot right down to her lungs and down still, to engulf her liver, the
kidneys, the kneecaps. Her own skin felt suddenly foreign to her, as if
someone had thrown her soul under a glass dome and made it watch as her
empty body moved around.
The sounds inside the chamber were muted. From a distance came the lapping
of sea waves. In front of her, inside the mirror, something was standing
next to Nell’s reflection. Something that wasn't in the actual room with her
- but belonged, instead, to the world of the mirror itself.
It was small and hunched, limping in the greyness. It had enormous hands, a
hairy back, and elongated limbs ending in large hands and feet.
Nell had seen that particular monster in many of her nightmares since Jack
had died. It was the demon who'd framed her father, smiling at her now with
fangs of a wild boar.
Lifting a muddy claw, the demon erased the golden speckles in the
reflection of Nell's eye. Under its touch, the pigment turned into dust and
vanished. Both of Nell's irises were now the same shade of deep, warm
brown.
“Miss Ruell.”
Nell found herself thrown back into her own body when Turnball's hand
landed on her shoulder. The brocade of the burgundy dress rubbed
uncomfortably against her undergarments. Her fingers and toes were tingling.
The waves had vanished – and so had something else.
Nell touched her cheekbone, staring in disbelief at the mirror.
Her gold. The speckles in her eye. Her precious token, the only leverage
she had. It was gone, dissolved into thin air.
Nell turned around and grabbed the governess's forearm.
“What did you do to me?”
The woman gazed blankly back at her.
“I just finished styling your hair. Now you're presentable for…”
Nell stood up, kicking away the stool she'd been sitting on, and pulled
Turnball's arm so hard that her nails dug through the woman's chemise
directly into her flesh.
“He said I'd be safe here. Anderson, he promised!”
“I don't know what you are talking about, miss. I suggest you let go of me
this instant, before I…”
Nell pushed the woman away and ran to the door. The hinges creaked under
her forceful push.
“Emory Anderson!” Nell shouted across the corridors, dragging her silk-clad
feet on the marble floors. “Where are you? You promised. You told me no
spirit could touch me here!”
She tripped on her skirts and stopped to pull gracelessly at the laces of
her bodice. Her ribcage had barely room to expand at every laboured breath
she took. She didn't belong in those clothes, nor in that mansion. She'd
been a fool to believe her plan could work. All around her, the walls were
crowded with Lady Blackwood's portraits, quietly laughing at her. The damned
witch had tricked her, and Nell had allowed it.
She yelled, fury burning in her chest for the need to destroy something. Or
someone.
“Cornelia?”
Anderson's arms surrounded her. Nell pushed him away; he held her tighter.
He was in his shirtsleeves, the waistcoat dangling unbuttoned from his
sides.
“What did you do to me? My eyes. You stole my gold; it was mine, it
belonged to me! It was the only thing that belonged to me!”
“I want you to take a deep breath now. Do you hear me, Cornelia? You're
safe. Breathe in deeply and tell me what happened.”
Nell sobbed rather than breathed, but Anderson seemed satisfied with
that.
“A demon,” she told him, her voice shaking. “It came to me through the
mirror. It stole the gold I had in my eye. Ursula said it was my gift. It
was my bargaining chip, and now I lost it!”
“Cornelia Marie Ruell. Look at me.”
Emory Anderson took her face in his hands. His grey eyes bore into hers,
grave as she'd never seen them before.
“I need you to listen to me very carefully now. Do you think you can do
that?”
Nell nodded.
“Your eyes," the doctor said. «Have always been brown. Nothing but brown. There was no gold in them.”
***
Robin "This is me, Robin, in short: collector of secondhand books, coffee lover, and unrepentant geek; I write mainly dark fantasy and steampunk. I published two short stories in a couple of Italian fantasy anthologies in 2019 and 2022. In 2023 I self-published my first novel, “Nell Ruell Goes to Hell”, (in Italian, writing as RJ Driscoll) a dark fantasy tale set in Victorian London. “Nell Ruell” follows the twisted journey of a strong-willed girl through a rather Carrollian afterlife, on her way to reclaim the power that was taken from her. I am currently working on a prequel novella dedicated to Emory, a genderfluid character who tries to navigate identity, love, and choices in a world that demands picking only one side."
The Kindness of London (Standing on London Bridge)
by Caprice May
When you’re trans
As I am
And you live
In London
As I do
And you stand
On London Bridge
As I am
Right now
Admiring The city lights
Breathing in
The chill
Night-time
December
River air
Very aware how
This city
Wraps around me
Cradles me
Loves me
Like nowhere
Else could
Ah. the kindness
Of the city
Lifts me up
Runs through
My veins
As if nowhere
Nowhere else
Could be
The same
Sweet kind city
Your cold clear air
Seeps in
Into my lungs
Your shimmering lights
Light up my veins
To me nowhere
Nowhere else
Could possibly
Ever be
The same
***
Caprice Jackson (writing as Caprice May) founded Queer Write in 2019. She has a great passion for writing and was formerly a published children’s book author and illustrator. Her self-published works are the novella ‘Run London’ and the children’s picture book ‘Beyond!’. She also writes and performs poetry and is currently completing the novel ‘Dharma Road’. For her day job she teaches English at Morley College, Waterloo branch, in London and is the college's union (UCU) EDI rep.
The lighthouse
by Marianne Lynch
My soul is light.
Perhaps the most fundamental element – the first words of the creator were
“let there be light” and the light from the sun is the ultimate source of
sustenance for almost every living thing on Earth.
An energy so powerful that time, length and mass all warp to preserve the
universality of its speed.
Sparks kindled the first of my kind centuries ago – simple fires on hill
tops that were built and tended with benevolent purpose: to guide those who
are lost.
Over time, our purpose changed from guidance to warning. Now, we have saved
countless thousands of sparks from being quenched by the waves.
The sparks that kindled me were brief – they burnt out centuries ago
despite my nurturing them within my own structure. But even in their brief
luminescence they gave rise to ideas that have diffracted throughout the
world.
The building materials and methods of jointing wood that gave my tower
stability.
The mirrors and lenses that focus my beams.
The data and messages encoded into rotations and flashes of my light.
My light continues, perhaps as long as the sun illuminates the Earth,
perhaps as long as there is a Moon and stars to navigate by.
Perhaps as long as there is another light, a light of consciousness to
perceive mine.
***
Marianne Lynch is a science and maths tutor who tries to find ways to use creative writing to discuss and explain scientific concepts. Having completed a PhD in physics, she is always struck by how vital it is for scientists and mathematicians to develop their own communication skills and sees writing as an excellent way to develop her own. She also blogs about science at https://www.polymathtutor.com/polymathblog and tries to highlight real world issues that are relevant to common science topics taught in schools.
Undisturbed
by Lynsay Mackay
The Sound travels
A crash
A bang
A clang
Heads swivel, ears perk
There is no repeat
All is quiet
All is well
The Sound travels
Wishes by Lynsay Mackay
Sometimes when I'm lonely
I'll think to make a wish
Throw a penny in the fountain
And ask it of the fish
Rub the lamp and ask the genie
Pick the petals from the bloom
Blow an eyelash to the heavens
Light a candle in the gloom
The secret of the lonely
Is that hope is never far
What's why at night I'll look aloft
And wish upon a star
But wishes are for children
They won't cure me of my ills
The longing for another
Can be the kind that kills
Can a dragon eat a rice cooker?
by Lynsay Mackay
Have we ever had so much and understood so little?
To buy a rice cooker and have it arrived tomorrow
But be unable to build a fire to boil the water
Nor tend the paddy fields that grow the rice
To not know or care about the labour
That goes into an easy existence
How can there be so much
When I see others with so little
Who owns a second house, a third, a forth, a fifth
Until your grandmother and mine
Pays rent on the place she fades away in
To a conglomerate of meaningless letters
Which house is home in an embarrassment of riches?
You can live in only one
While there are those who roam the streets
Searching for a doorway to shelter in
From the rain and the cold
From the bullets and the bombs
A plethora of doorway choices for others
Where does abundance go, if not to those who toil?
To work and have enough
A concept now so foreign
as to be obsolete
Instead an expectation
of make do and mend
Recycle your plastic and tins
Whilst dragons sit in caves
Protected by the walls and barbed wire
of a thousand bloodied fingers
Hoarding gold they cannot eat
The Price
by Lynsay Mackay
Another year passes and my face remains unchanged
It is said one does not age past the 1st day of fame or addiction
I am both
The world's most famous addict
Kept young and unmatured by the curse of immortality
With not the strength to walk out into the bright sun of midday
Defeated by the arrogance of supremacy
I am other, therefore greater, therefore better
I am the words and thoughts of a thousand years
Not cared for or loved
Made petulant by the knowledge
I was forever
I am forever
I will be forever
And all I yearn for, is nevermore
Lynsay Mackay is a queer writer living in the Scottish Highlands. Her short stories have been published in Girl Wrestling Fan, Will You Marry Me? and Hoovering the Roof II, which won the National Writers Guild Association, Anthology of the Year. She enjoys writing poetry and flash fiction with themes of nature, justice and love and draws upon the beautiful environment she lives in for inspiration. When not writing or working she can be found in the kitchen, baking occasionally, but more likely, experimenting with some new cooking technique she just read about.
Deliverance
by Tray Morgan
(Sitting for a photograph - early 19th Century)
I wish I could smile for this picture, the restraints of our time
are stifling and inhibit me even here in this private room in the
back quarters of a rare understanding soul. I am indebted to my
travels on the sea. I arrived a boy and sailed many years to the
man I am today. My beautiful knight stands beside me, tenderly
and discretely holding my hand as we pose for our picture.
Benjamin’s heart, full of such sweet kindness and a natural sincerity
is purer than any minister preaching the purity of their devine God.
Such righteous beliefs would extinguish the flame of our life, not just
diminish the joyful light of our love with prerequisite rules and twisted
thoughts and ideals for honouring the saviour. Our love is vile some
say, yet it has many qualities I, a white man, was taught to have.
God, grant me deliverance from their saviour. No true divine creator
could banish a love such as ours; a bond of souls that touches this
shared world. Will we always be damned by those who profess
through scripture to know our kind, to curse us as unclean whilst
hiding behind a veneer of love and honour? Religion created by man,
sings of love whilst spouting hate. God loves all created. I heard God
calling me to the sea where I found my Benjamin. Where I found true
love and divine faith,
My Deliverance.
***
Tray aka Morgan lives in Nottinghamshire, writes poetry and is working on her first book of speculative fiction which incorporates themes of healing and self discovery following trauma.
Queer V&A
by Erika Niesner
Queer Write took an excursion to the V&A Museum for the LGBTQ+ tour of their vast collection. Our guide was the V&A’s magnificent Jack Shoulder. The following are reflections from our tour, and quotes from Jack. Follow him at #TodayinQueerHistory.
Progress pride flag
Always on display at the V&A
Eight colours reduced to six by Gilbert Baker
Expanded for AIDS with black
and brown for more people we love
Daniel Quasar 'designed in' progress
The chevron a new sign of motion
Jack reminds us of the joy of the rainbow
Where it hangs “we recognise safety”
Kehinde Wiley
Gay artist paints Naomi Campbell
as a Spanish princess
Shows us the power of the sword
The woman of all eras
Crosses lawns before hills
Mounts the horse,
adorned and poised
Sheathes her sword
If she must fight, she will
Diana goddess of moon and hunt
Artemisia, not her bro' Apollo,
headed hunting, a masculine pursuit
Never had a lover, unlike her brother
Transfigured men into stags
Her valid rejection of romance
Shinto Sun Goddess
Fought with her sibling twin
Retreated into a mountain cave
All lights dimmed
Except in her rocky retreat
A hot dazzling den of stone
Sun in cave, light in darkness
Keeping the brightness to herself
Until the goddess of dance twirled outside
Coaxing Amaterasu from her cave
For a dance worth sharing her shine
Donatello’s and Michelangelo's Davids
Small and big Davids
1850s copies from Florence
when casts were given as gifts
Subject, artists and place
all brimming with queerness
Florence was a haven for gays
more Florentine men, than not, were
accosted for mutual pleasure crimes
Michelangelo loved his models
His diaries yearned for men
until altered by his grand nephew
from hes to shes
A queer palimpsest uncovered
David, the original, loved King Saul's son
who was killed, to David's sorrow
Although David was married
he cried in a very cool way, “like a girl”
his rockbody curling in tears
Donatello’s David keeps Goliath’s head underfoot
His post-battle pose is under wrought
Michelangelo’s conquest is yet to roll
The moment before battle – the beauty
of the man who has not yet fought
Hadrian's coin
The Roman emperor on the coin
wore a beard to cover acne
His wife Sabina did not "like
his beard or being his beard"
His lover, Antinous, from Asia Minor
with "curly hair and pouty lips"
died on an Egyptian cruise and
Hadrian turned the empire to worship
His lover lost on the Nile
Elagabalus, later emperor
dressed as Venus, was a bride
1000 years ago a trans person in power
Assassinated young
A tiny coin… with a bright bling
Echo and Narcissus
She loved him and turned into an echo. He into flower
Both in love not reciprocated
His reflection left as lonely as he was
A man who longed for the man who was himself
***
Credits
LGBTQ V&A https://www.vam.ac.uk/info/lgbt
Pride flags https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/the-progress-pride-flag
Portrait of Naomi Campbell by Kehinde Wiley, 2024
Diana the Huntress by Joseph Nollekens, 1778
Mirror, Japan 1250-1350
Davids by Donatello 1430-1440 and Michaelangelo 1501-1504
Four coins, 100-300
Narcissus by Valerio Cioli, 1560
Words and photos by Erika Niesner with ideas and quotes from Jack Shoulder. Images on this page are for viewing only. All images remain the copyright of the artists and the gallery.
***
Erika Niesner is an Australian–British writer and editor living in London. She edits medical research and produces multimedia for science and the arts. She studied behavioural science, and is an English PhD candidate researching the use of non-chronological time in fiction and queer histories.
A Diverse Bunch
by Caprice May
I wrote this story in 2024. With the Supreme Court ruling in April 2025 it has taken on extra meaning. It is about the human cost of edicts delivered on high.
They were a diverse bunch, the netball team. The youngest, Sophie, was 18 and newly out of school. At the other end of age spectrum there was Rose. She was 70, but amazingly lithe and dexterous for her age, and quick thinking on the court. Ruby fitted right in. She’d only taken up the sport in her mid-twenties. Now 28, she loved the Wednesday evenings when they played their matches. She never missed a game nor the training sessions on Monday nights. I wrote
The women in the team loved her, too. She was a little taller than most of them, but not nearly as tall as some of the women they came up against. Axford, their local rivals, had a couple of plus six-footers; very hard to defend against when they were both playing! ‘The Axford Amazons’, the women called them.
What the women loved about Ruby was not her ability, which was pretty average, but her spirit and the fact she laughed and joked with the rest of them. And although, like all of them, she sometimes made mistakes, she always gave her all. The only difference between Ruby and the rest of them was she was a transwoman.
Rival teams never commented on this. It was true, if you looked closely, there was something a little masculine about her features. Ruby, though, had had full corrective surgery at age 23 and had taken all the prescribed medical interventions. Naturally, too, she had changed all her documentation.
“Yay! We beat them at last!” called out Rose, raising a glass, following a one point victory over Axford. They were in their favourite pub, the Painted Lady, just round the corner from the town leisure centre where they played and trained.
“It was your interceptions that made all the difference!” said a woman called Fatima, turning to the young Sophie, who simply smiled, looking a bit embarrassed.
“Team effort!” threw in Rose.
“Let’s drink to team effort!” cried Ruby and they all raised their glasses, making sure they touched glasses with every single member of the group.
“Brought them down to size, didn’t we?” observed the 5 foot 2 inch Pauline, which made them all laugh, coming from the shortest member of their team.
“And let’s not forget Camille and all those tips and tricks she drilled into us!” added Rose, looking at Camille, the team coach, sat opposite her, who shook her head vigorously.
“What I do’s the easy part,” replied the quiet spoken coach, continuing to shake her head.
“No, it isn’t!” countered Fatima, giving the older woman a bump with her shoulder. “We’d be lost without you!”
“Yes! Yes!” they all chimed in and so they continued, a merry bunch laughing and cracking jokes and sharing stories until the bell to go home was rung.
It was the following Monday when the women did their weekly training session in the leisure centre. At the end of the session Camille discreetly said to Ruby, “Can I have a word with you, love?” Camille called everyone love.
Rose was standing not far away and looked interested.
“Just me and Ruby, love,” said the coach to Rose, giving her a slightly forbidding look.
When they were away from earshot, Camille began to speak. “ I don’t know how to tell you this, love,” she said, looking a little distressed. “You see I got this email from the County Netball Association this morning.They’ve got this new rule. They say it comes from the National Association…” Tears were welling up in the coach’s eyes. She paused to try and compose herself, then went on, “Well, simply that we’re not allowed anymore to include anyone not born a woman in competitive matches.”
Ruby looked down at the polished wooden boards of the court floor. She didn’t know what to say. Tears rose to her eyes, too.
After a while, Camille broke the silence.
“I know, love, it’s not fair! Just some political thing that’s come down from on high.”
Ruby fought back the tears.
“It’s not your fault at all, Camille, I know… and you’re right, it’s a political thing… all the way from this nasty minded government, which’d sooner we didn’t exist!” And with that she burst into floods of tears.
“There, there, love!” said Camille, embracing the sobbing woman tightly.
The commotion brought over all the other women to see what had happened Camille, at first, didn’t want to say and Ruby was too distraught.
It was Rose who, after a minute or two, spoke out. Whether or not she’d overheard some of the conversation or not, she seemed to understand. As Rose always was, she was forthright.
“It’s those bloody, so-called feminists, isn’t it? Want to exclude transwomen from sport and say it’s all about fairness and bla-di-bla-di-bla! That’s what it is, isn’t it?”
This was Rose, whose mother had taken her as a 14 year-old, to join the picket line for the striking women at Dagenham, who’d marched for women’s rights, gay rights and against racism in the 70’s, sat down in front of Cruise missiles at Greenham Common in the 80’s and much, much more….
“Is it, Camille?” asked Pauline, looking concerned. There was a pause.
“Yes, it is,” said the coach quietly, shaking her head regretfully.
“Doesn’t sound right to me,” chimed in Fatima. “Ruby, she’s one of us. Why should they kick her out?”
This made Ruby bawl all the louder and Fatima wrapped her arms around her.
“Listen,” said Rose, becoming thoughtful. “We need a strategy. We need to support our sister.”
“What are you thinking?” asked one of the women.
“I don’t know yet,” said Rose. “When I was at Greenham Common way back when, I was there for almost a year, and I learnt how to strategise. We would always sit down and weigh up the options, what were the pros and cons of any action, what was most likely to succeed and what the effects might be.” Then, looking around all the faces, she added, “Is everyone in?”
With one voice they all roared, “Yes!”
“Time to wind up, ladies!” boomed the voice of Clarence, the centre’s security man.
“To the Painted Lady!” cried out Fatima.
“To the Painted Lady!” they echoed back.
Quickly gathering up their kit bags and such they exited the centre. Two of them on either side of Ruby cradled her as she now managed a small smile of gratitude. To the pub they went, their mission one of sisterly solidarity to decide on how to put right the wrong of what they all saw as a flagrant injustice and uncalled for intrusion in their lives.
A love letter to Queer Write
by Paul Taylor-Pitt
April 2025
I have a complicated relationship to belonging. On one hand I love the sense of community, connection and collaboration that comes from being part of a group, but too often I’ve experienced the shadow side of belonging: conformity. If you want to be in, you better not stand out. Show your sameness or you don’t get past the door. Sometimes I’m desperate to be admitted. Often, I walk by unbothered if I’m not invited across the threshold.
My explanation of this ambivalence is that I’m an only child. A gay one too. The first, and last, of my name. The stories people tell about only-children are that we can be selfish, anti-social and lonely. They don’t tend to talk about the freedom that comes from being ok in your own company and the sense of independence that can be experienced in the absence of having to share space. The idea itself of being an only child is shaped by a negative. You’re a person who grows up without siblings. I have never experienced a sense of without, because I don’t miss what I have never had.
Similarly, I have never wished I was straight. Despite growing up in Scotland in the 1970s and ‘80s – not a great time to be gay – I always had a bone deep understanding that there was nothing wrong with who I was. Any negativity in the collective consciousness came, in my opinion, from a place of ignorance and mediocrity. If the world had a problem with me being gay, it was a problem the world would have to get over. The stories they told about us then, and to some extent now, demonised us as sad and lonely at best and a threat to civilisation at worst. Growing up in that toxic climate was not easy but I refused to let it blunt the wholeness and sharpness that I felt in my sense of self.
Seeing clearly my own truths in the face of so much obfuscation turned out to be something of a super-power. You think only-children are like this? I’ll show you what I am. You say queer people are all like that? Just stand back and watch what I can do. Owning myself, embracing my difference and feeling able to voice my side of the story helped me create a path for myself in life that gives me the freedom to be me, on my own terms.
That sense of freedom came to an emergency stop in 2020 when we entered the storm of a global pandemic. Covid-19 has left scars on our community psyche, through loss of loved ones or exacerbation of divisions that had been simmering under the surface of society but there were occasional silver linings on the clouds. While navigating uncharted waters, the Queer Write group appeared like a lighthouse in the fog. Over the next year, I wrote my heart out for two hours every week. I wrote my story, to myself, as an act of understanding. I mined my memory for funny moments, awkward encounters and emotional bruises, laying them out in black and white week by week. I got to know myself properly in this group.
Half a decade later, the group still meets every week. I am a more-than-occasional-if-not-every-time member where I continue to find inspiration in the faces, ambition and strength of the space. What keeps me coming back is not just the writing, but the true spirit of belonging without conformity. Inclusion that celebrates difference. The group helps me write more about myself so I can be more myself. Along the way I wrote a book which is being published in the autumn of this year. None of the writing I did during the pandemic made it into the book, but getting those words out helped to clear the pipes for the ideas to flow. My book would not exist without Queer Write.
Telling, re-telling and shaping our stories is a transformative power. To do this in community amplifies the potency of that power to a place where anything, and everything, is possible. Queer Write is a celebration of our potential, week by week, story by story, word by word. There is space for all of us, even the ones who don’t fit in. Especially them. For they are us.
Dr. Paul Taylor-Pitt (he/him) is a facilitator, coach and mentor who makes change easy for the individuals, teams and organisations he works with. His first book, Still Here! Still Queer! Now What? A Guide To LGBTQ+ Wellness & Wholeness is coming everywhere this October. He is @showingwhole on all the socials.
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Afterword
Thank you so much for joining us on this journey! This small anthology is dedicated to Queer people everywhere and especially those who use their creativity to express themselves. May you, all the Queer people in this world, be loved and respected and always treated fairly.
Caprice May 9August 2026
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