Remember Me--Trans Day of Remembrance reflection for LGB folks
by: peterson toscano
Thu Nov 20, 2008 at 10:04:02 AM EST
http://www.pamshouseblend.com/showDiary.do;jsessionid=307C86E9BE6C71872295F25EB370C971?diaryId=8334I first read the play Hamlet when I was 13 years old. Although I refused to read any assigned books in English class, I secretly read a bunch of unassigned books on the side. Hamlet had been one of my first covert literary diversions. I still remember how moved I felt when the ghost of Prince Hamlet's father, once a powerful king and warrior, pleads with his son, "Remember me."
No longer mighty, no longer in control of his own life, all that remains is the memory of the Danish king in the minds and hearts of others. Considering the violence and treachery that led to the King's assassination, the plaintive request gave me a deep pang at the injustice of his death and the fragility of his life.
On Tuesday night I attended the Transgender Day of Remembrance commemoration in Seattle, WA. This is the fourth year in a row I have gone to this event that remembers the all too many transgender people who have been murdered in the past year. Sitting there Tue night, hearing over and over how these trans women and men (and even the parent of a trans child) experienced unbelievably violent and cruel deaths, I felt a deep pang again. After each trans person read one of the narratives, they concluded with the simple phrase, "We remember."
