Pose star and activist Indya Moore is urging people to include black trans individuals in the fight against oppression and injustice. On Thursday, Moore—who is non-binary and uses “they/them” pronouns—posted a powerful video performing a poem they wrote called “Can I Come Too?”
In it, they illuminate how members of the trans and queer community are often cast aside amid calls for black liberation and how, in the backdrop of national protests, they’ve continued to face violence and aggression from cis men and women.
Moore evoked the memory of Muhlaysia Booker, a 22-year-old transgender woman who was killed in Dallas last year. They also noted that trans women of color in the Americas have a shocking life expectancy of 30-35 years. Moore earnestly asks when the “right” time for trans and queer liberation will be, and emphasizes that highlighting violence in the community must happen now—publicly.
“This is a poem I wrote based on my response to a young black cis man who told me that I was causing harm to the black liberation movement by centering the violence black trans women are experiencing in our community,” Moore said on Instagram. “I wrote the poem and expanded it for an amazing Youtube program hosted by a powerful black man in Hollywood which is coming out soon that I am so honored I was thought of to be included in. I just can’t wait any longer for the world to see and hear it.”
Moore’s poem comes after more than 15,000 demonstrators gathered at the Brooklyn Museum to march for the end of violence against black trans people. The American Medical Association has called the killing of trans women of color an epidemic. Two trans women—Dominique Rem’Mie Fells and Riah Milton—were murdered just days leading up to the March.
Moore shared that they were inspired to share the poem early because of Noname, the Chicago rapper who shared her new track “Song 33” on Thursday.
