We met in rooms where curtains learned to close
on names the outside world refused to speak,
and built a space where coded language grows
from borrowed chairs and courage kept discreet.
A magazine was passed from hand to hand,
ink-stained proof that we were not alone,
each typed confession forming common land
beneath a world that claimed we had no home.
We learned to write ourselves into the air
with articles too careful to be safe,
yet still they carried something like a flare
through cities where the truth was out of place.
No banners then, no loud parade of claim—
just quiet pages daring to name a name.