Novelist and Storyteller
One of my identities is as a figure skater. For twenty years now, I have been practicing, learning new skills and tricks on the ice. For me, the ice is a source of grace, intimacy, and comradery. I see it as a practice of mindfulness, of Buddha nature, of beingness. On the best days, like …
Continue reading "Recognizing and Transforming Shame: A Zen Approach"
In a long year for our community since the beginning of Covid, we have experienced lockdowns, loneliness, fear and grieving as we mourned our lack of connection and intimacy. During this period, we first flattened the curve and then helplessly watched the wave of infections inundate us. Yet at the same time, we rediscovered community …
There is a Chinese Zen kōan, a teaching story about a pilgrimage that I won’t share with you today. If Zen teachers were lawyers, Zen practitioners would be required to sign a release which states that whenever a teacher says they will not do something, it means the opposite, especially if they use words that …
Recently, I rediscovered posts on Facebook about my travels seven months after my partner René Valdes died in February 2012. While I have preserved much of the immediacy of the record, I have used them to explore the universality of grief. desire and wonder that we feel daily in the pandemic. Oh, and that includes …
The musical Hamilton ends with the Finale, “Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story.” Our view of history has always been shaped not by the specific events themselves, but by who records and who remembers.Queer people are certainly not the only ones that have been eliminated from history or seen its history distorted by others. Straight white …
Continue reading "The Importance of Novels in Preserving Queer History"
Interview in My Queer Art ALAN LESSIK, SAN FRANCISCO WRITER, INTERVIEW What is your name? Alan Lessik Where are you from? San Francisco What kind of work do you create? Novels and commentaries What do you define yourself as? Or do you not? Why/Why not? Novelist, storyteller and alan of all trades How long have …
In 1996, I had the honor of interviewing the major players who engineered the inclusion of sexual orientation in the South African constitution. Simon Nkoli, Zackie Achmat, Edwin Cameroun and David Botha were among the leaders that I interviewed, each having their own crucial role to play. As I was pulling up the articles I …
Continue reading "Remembering Simon Nkoli: The White-washing of LGBT History in South Africa"
In 1995, I entered this essay in the "Greatest Moments of Pride" Contest in S.F. Frontiers Newsmagazine and was awarded 1st Place. Unfortunately, there are no on-line archives of the magazine from this period. The room fell silent as I slowly walked up to the podium. When I reached the front, I too fell silent …
Continue reading "Speaking Truth to Power–S.F. Frontiers Newsmagazine, June 8, 1995"
I wrote this article for the San Francisco Bay Guardian in 1996 after four trips to South Africa. I had the great fortune to interview the major players in the movement to include sexual orientation in the new constitution. Unfortunately, this article is not currently on-line. The Bay Guardian plans to open up archives of …
Continue reading "South Africa’s Gay Rights–San Francisco Bay Guardian, May 22, 1996"
I rediscovered this article I wrote in 1996 and sadly enough, its last paragraph is true again. "No person shall be unfairly discriminated against, directly or indirectly, and without derogating from the generality of this provision, on one or more of the following grounds in particular: race, gender, sex, ethnic or social origin, colour, sexual orientation, …
