title: Coming out of my closet.
abstract: Abstract Life's literalness provides the voice of this poem, embodying both symbol and actuality. These clothes exist. They are worn and take space, triggering simultaneous yearnings to snuggle into them and to purge them. It is the same with the memories they evoke. The closet, a space for storage or containment, is, for lesbians, also known as a place of hiding and of emergence. With its dark recesses bulging, the closet is rich with reminders of who we are. Hanging side by side in the cubicle of soul's memory, the vestments of history sometimes match and sometimes act as stark reminders of the different people we have been, and have been with. The presence of past loves often fills the limited space. There are moments for all of us when we want to shut the door, but memory asserts itself willfully or unwillfully, informing and forming what we have to choose from as we dress for the day.
authors.forename: Barbara
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Brown
keywords: Memory; closet; ex-lover; lesbian