It would be impossible for me to compile a bibliography of the scholarly and literary work of black gay men without acknowledging perhaps one of, if not the most important, figure in the history of black gay men's literature and that is of course, Joseph F. Beam.
I first encountered Beam's landmark work, In the Life when I was 20. I no longer recall what led me to this volume. I felt myself pulled in the same way I imagine birds are pulled South in wintertime or the way the tide is pulled by the gravity of the moon, by some unknown force, some biological or ecological necessity.
In the Life was in a solid maroon binding with white block letters along the spine. It blended perfectly with every other book on the shelves of the University Library. Yet, to me, it was so clearly unlike any other book on the shelf. I remember being puzzled because I expected it to be difficult to find. I expected it to be hidden or under guard, like most other images of black gay men at the time.
I believe that any black gay man who truly desires to be both at the same time can only go so far and so long until his sanity requires him to look in a mirror, to see himself reflected back. It takes some much longer than others, some it takes no time at all and others still go all their lives unvexed by an absence of self.
There is no correct path. Each path we walk is the path we must take, there is no other. We are who we are supposed to be. So in my case, it was only a matter of time before I became so starved for the sound of another black gay man's voice and words that I would have walked much farther than I actually ended up having to.
I devoured the book like the first crust of bread to a famished mouth. In the Life was a communion and a welcome, an unequivocal acknowledgement that I was not a product of my own imagination and perhaps most importantly that, at least a far as black gay men are concerned, I was not and am not one of kind, a fiction I valiantly challenge everyday as a black gay man in 2011.
When I think about the enormous courage it must have taken for a black gay man to compile an anthology of the work of other black gay men in America in 1985, my spine stiffens a little toward my own work. I simply have to point people to information that, for the most part by now, has been thoroughly documented. I have Google. I have library databases accessible by computer. Beam and others created something from nothing in a more hostile social environment than, I pray, I will ever know.
In the aftermath of the overturning of 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' in the U.S. Armed Forces and the legalization of gay marriage in New York state, we reach a summit many may have doubted we would ever reach. And while we rejoice in justice we must remain ever-vigilant. The summit of one mountain is the foot of another.
And in our vigilance we must also attend the ways justice is diffused along the fault lines of race and class and gender and sexuality.
Even as our world curves toward justice in the same way our planet's path is guided by gravity, I still must do this work. Because even as we live in a substantially more equitable world, indeed more equitable than many past worlds, I am still largely invisible.
I have learned to greet this truth with a shrug and keep my focus on my work, to take courage from from my forbears. I take courage from people who struggled against the same headwinds I do now, who managed to speak despite their fear their voices would be swallowed by the gale.
I owe many things to many people. I strive to exceed their expectations. The wisdom of Luke bangs in my head like a bell: "For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more." (Luke 12:48)
I owe something to Joseph Beam, much in fact. I strive to exceed his expectations: for what will be possible for black gay men to do, say and become in the future and for the future of black men's literature.
I bet you didn't know that in 1986 the first ever anthology of black gay men's writing was published by a man named Joseph Beam.
That's right. Titled In the Life, published by Allyson Press the book was considered a cultural hallmark by the gay and lesbian community but nevertheless was completely ignored by African-American critics and institutions.
Beam was born in Philadelphia and attended Franklin College, a small liberal arts school roughly 20 miles outside of Indianapolis and prior to his undergrad work he primarily attended parochial schools as he was baptized Catholic.
After leaving Franklin in the middle of a Masters in Communication in the early 1980s, Beam returned to his childhood home and worked in Giovanni's Rooom, a bookstore catering to gay and lesbian interests in Philadelphia. Shortly after beginning work at Giovanni's Room Beam's articles and short stories began appearing the gay press. In 1985 he became a consultant for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, joined the Executive Committee of the National Coalition of Black Lesbians and Gays and became editor of their then new, though now defunct, Black/Out Journal.
In 1986 Beam began collecting submissions for In the Life, with the goal of countering the absence of positive images of gay men of color in the media and their exclusion from the social justice efforts of white gay rights activists.
Beam was working on a sequel to In the Life at the time of his death from HIV related illness in 1989. The work was later completed by Beam's mother and Beam's long-time friend and collaborator, Essex Hemphill. The work was published in 1991 and titled Brother to Brother, after one of Hemphill's own poems.
So many things to do. So very little time. And of that time so much is spent deciding upon what to do and when to do it.
So much has changed since the year 1989 and yet the lease on many black men's lives remains short indeed. From beyond I heed the counsel of those gone before, artists, thinkers, leaders, doers one and all: whatever there is to say, say it now; whatever there is to write, write it now, whatever there is to do, do it now.
To those who are one thing and many things; to those do not know; to those who refuse to know; to those who take some sustenance in this profile of courage.
And to Joseph Beam: this is for you.
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