I’ve never been rebellious
As other parents watched longingly
I wanted my family involved
It takes work to push someone so far
For them to have alienated me so.

I remember longingly,
Cub Scouts days flown past.
It was my first community
My selfhood first and last.

I hand them my monthly rent
Until I can set out on my own.
And I keep mostly to myself
With my landlords down below.
Can’t make too much noise.

I through the ranks endeavored
And with my troop I’d grown
Over years, my parents joined
How could I have ever known?

She doesn’t know I have a convict
As one of my best friends.
If she did I know what she’d say:
“Don’t let him in the house.”
Sometimes I’d wished she cared.

Many hearty times together
My family and I share
Intertwined within the Scouts
Our lives invested there.

We’re still respectable
We still exchange smiles and laughs
But it’s not that of a family—
But that a cordial stranger
Because they don’t know me anymore.

They lead the revolution
When they found out I was gay
I couldn’t believe it happened
I left the Scouts that day.

That’s the thing: They don’t know
When my smile is empty
And when I’m reliving the memory
Of what happened on a night
Of which they’ll never know.

They still come home with stories
Of the life they made me leave
And in my silent exile
I’m left alone to grieve.

I’m not even allowed to reveal my affections
So how could I tell them he acted on his?
They don’t know about that night.
They don’t know I can’t forgive him.
Or that I can’t forgive myself.

08/31/2007

Author's Note: This poem is a rare self-reflective poem about myself, my father and my step-mother. I don't even feel like part of the family anymore with as much as they've pushed me away.

My mother moved across the country, but I still talk to her almost every day. I have to go to school here in Texas, though. She knows everything that the parents I live with don't.

Posted on 09/01/2007
Copyright © 2026 Jason Hannigan