Guest columists
“The Unimaginable” Guest Writer: Bishop Hartsel Clifton Shirley Emile Alphonse Griffith was born February 3, 1938, in St. Thomas, the U.S. Virgin Islands. In his teenage years, Griffith worked at a hat factory. On one particularly steamy day, the owner allowed him to work shirtless. That owner, a former amateur boxer, noticed Emile’s promising physique and took the [...]
“Do You Have Your Membership Card?” Guest Writer: R. L. Norman We were sitting at my home in the living room having a nightcap. In the olden days, a nightcap was another name for a booty call after a date. And we’d just returned from a date. We went to dinner at a rooftop restaurant that [...]
“Believe in Dreams” Guest Writer: W.D. Foster-Graham Thank you, Wyatt, for the wonderful opportunity you have given me to be one of your guest columnists. Not only is this my 20th post with you, but it is also my second anniversary in that capacity. Indeed, February 2019 marked my debut as the Old School New Kid. As such, [...]
“Pretty Baby” Guest Writer: Bishop Hartsel Clifton Shirley Throughout the Great Migration (1916-1970), roughly seven million Blacks from the southern United States traveled to the North, Midwest, and West to escape racism, seek work in manufacturing cities, and obtain better educational opportunities. Bronzeville, an area of Chicago near Hyde Park, attracted a Black gay population—which snowballed. The relative sexual [...]
“Lookin’ Thru the Looking Glass” Guest Writer: R. L. Norman As I sat there, I just stared into space, oblivious to my situation for a brief moment. I felt like I was in a dream; as a matter of fact, a dream that was a nightmare that I wanted to wake up from. I just stared [...]
“Didn’t You Know” Guest Writer: W.D. Foster-Graham My brothas and sistahs, it has been a pleasure to see The Right To Be: A Christopher Family Novel (my first full male-male romance novel) come to fruition. Then again, when you’re doing something you love doing, it’s not work. Following your passion surely has its rewards; since my last column, [...]
“On the Field” Guest Writer: Bishop Hartsel Clifton Shirley HUT ONE! HUT TWO! HUT THREE! HIKE! Whispers. Secrets. Conceal and hide! So goes life if you’re gay in football. And enthusiasts of one of America’s favorite pastimes rejecting homophobia appears to be as complicated and difficult as it is for bigots to reject racism. Roy Franklin Simmons was once [...]
“BLACKS DO READ: KUUMBA, KUJICHAGULIA, AND UJAMAA” Guest Writer: W.D. Foster-Graham When I embarked on my journey as a novelist, my first novel, Mark My Words, was 17 years in the making: five years to write it and another 12 to get it published. I was naïve, believing that traditional publishing was the only game in town. Tiffany [...]
“Turn the Beat Around” Guest Writer: R. L. Norman Honey Let Me Tell You Something: I’m lying here in the darkness of my bedroom. I’ve closed the shades to shut the world out. I’m feeling like I don’t have a care in the world as I let my troubles stay outside my door, and [...]
“Political Trailblazer” Guest Writer: Bishop Hartsel Clifton Shirley America's current political state has the country waiting with bated breath for the first Black Vice President, Kamala Harris. Very few people know or even remember that not too long ago, there was a Black Gay man who was nominated for that position as well. [...]
"Playing It Forward" Guest Writer: W.D. Foster-Graham As an African American gay man of a certain age, I find that my definition of success has changed over the years. The dream I had so long ago of being a published author, writing the books I wanted to read, having readers who love my books, has come true. With that dream realized, [...]
"Before Pose" Guest Writer: Bishop Hartsel Clifton Shirley Pose is the current television program that unapologetically displays the lives of gay, lesbian and transgender individuals. For some of us, it’s just short of sacred as it helps to reveal the hidden lives, pains, heartbreaks, and joys of a segment of the population all too often overlooked, ignored--and even worse--forgotten. Mainstream television has [...]
