I wanna speak 

Something

Pretty with prose

Confession

Regression 

About

Ugly and truthful

Real

Personal

Pandemic

Shit

Wrap words around 

A story

A telling

Of a life

A life story

One 

Rose-up

Through ashes

Not a Phenix

Not a myth

Not a martyr 

Just a man

A boy

X

Y

Trash born

A baby

A thought

Worth having

Or maybe not

Accidents

Happen

Fallouts

Happen

Gaps grow

Needing knowing

Giving form

That’s a life

Worth reading

Seeing

Being

Gonna go backward

Forward

Nonlinear

Ahead 

Forward

Always only 

Forward

Who knows

Nobody

Futures constant calling

56 accumulated

Sun rotations 

Tapping out

Single words

Entire

Thoughts

Open 

Ended

Two plagues

Inn

Survived

So far

Bringing me

Here

Once 

Home

Once 

More

Once

time

Gray day shouting

Drops pelting

Windy City

Unsettled

Like my head

A scattering

Splattering

Mash-up

Remembrances

Slippery memories 

Hold 

Then slither

Rise again 

Fall asunder 

And then resurface

Panic

Call

Waves and rain

Splatter, crash, spit

Drowning  

Deafening

Headspace 

Yesterdays

Todays

Tomorrows 

Life measures in love

And loves loss

Is’ ent that how it's done

Not days

Retaining walls

Hopefully holding

Getting 

To the point

A beginning

Death Sentenced 

Is how it began

Framed by bodies 

Souls gone missing 

An epic disappearance

Of mostly men 

Barley men 

Just past boyhood

Within boyhood 

Predominately gay

Transgendered 

Homosapien 

Homos

Queers

Freaks

Queens

Trans 

Taken

Prime of life

Wiped off the face of the earth

Infected

H

I

V 

A virus

Positive 

Plagued away

Shamed

To death

Even as they lay waiting

Knowing

Unknown

Gay cancer

They called it

Inevitable ending 

Untouchable

Quarantined 

A ward

A separate wing

Isolated 

Their hearts

Rapidly

Weakening 

Beating alone

Until not

Abandoned

Emptied of life 

Bodies of men

Who loved men

Zipped into body bags

Gone forever gone

Years and Years 

Of fucking fear

Sucking fear

Kissing fear

Touching fear

Holding fear

Where a body should have been nestled

Loving

Loveless

Loved less

Love lost

Loves potential

Ghosted 

A void 

Evermore

Singular

In a coupled world

We didn’t matter

The infected

Diseased

With 

A

I

D

S

Faggots

Worthless

Declared 

Right 

Religious

White men 

White women

Pulpited

Radical breeders

Hatred inducing

Fevered

Infectious

Christians

Self-declared

Vessels of the light

mind polluters 

Hate speechers

Hate teaching

Self-possessed

So-called

Righteous 

Men and women of Christ

Backward 

Non-thinking

Teaching 

Preaching 

Converting

Christ’s Love language

Re-written 

In their

Ugly

Hatred

Likeness

Their supremacy

Of divisiveness 

Whiteness

Who’s clarion call

Declared

God’s will

Be done

Populations 

Ate 

It 

Up

Still supping 

Bullshit

Hatred won

Still winning

Everybody

Bought in

Hive

Inherited 

Established 

FEAR

FEAR

FEAR

FEAR

FEAR

Filthy 

Butt fucking fags

Should die

Yep that’s what they preached

God’s will be done

Sodomite 

Vilified

Nasty men

Perverts

Pedophiles

Lumped into one sum

Gays

Deserving of death

That is what the press reported

Every headline

Repeated words printed

Airwaves filled

Televised

Sound bites

Over and over 

Same story 

Built a case 

Guilty

Perverts

Untouchable

Deserved

Diseased

Justified

Vengeful 

God

Just image 

Psychological 

Psycho

Babel  

Brain warping 

Heart collapsing

Soul dividing

Justified 

Hatred

Disgust

Judgment

That reached 

Everyone

Everyone

Everyone

Everywhere

My self 

Included

I’m gonna say it again

My self 

Included

That’s 

T

R

A

U

M

A

I’m wearing it

Stitch into my soul

Quilted 

Patch-worked

Remember

The pieces 

Assembled

Into one remembrance

A gigantic quilt

Carpeted 

The National Mall

Political 

Pandemic

A cozy look

Didn’t soften

The sobs

Dry wet eyes

Return

The unreturnable

Splitting seems 

The weight of sorrow

Holding in

Held within

My

B

O

D

Y

Always caressing

Them 

All 

Their names

Stitched together

Letters 

Chained

Sequenced 

D

N

A

Linked

One to the other

The infected

Uninfected

The dis-ease

Of disease

Infects everyone

C

O

V

I

D 

Taught the planet

What 

A

I

D

S 

Tutored

Lesson

Viruses

Are plural 

Global

Get it

Infections

Are mental

First

Physical

Second

Nobody

Is immune 

Just veering 

Degrees

Of dissociation 

Denial

Gay’s being a minority

Didn’t matter much

No matter what

Your make-up

If caught

A virus

Devastatingly 

Transmitted

Through intimacy

A one-night stand

Lovemaking

Friendly Fucking

Casual sex

Fluids

Exchanged

Needles

Between men

Between women

Between Trans

Yes it happens 

Really happens

Still Happening

A president 

Called Regan

Couldn’t 

Wouldn't

Say the word

A

I

D

S 

And then

Nothing

Everything

Was ever the same

Fear filled inn 

Every space

Every gap

Every breath

Every touch

Every possibility

Un-became 

Once boys

Once men

Once lover

Once friends

Once family

Once no more

At present

More than 700,000 people

Gone 

That is what a plague does

Removes people

Planet washing

Indiscriminately 

Has not stopped

Nor the stigma

Of being Positive

Feel how 

Something

Inside

Become 

Uncomfortable

When heard

Try saying

A million times 

To a million minds

I’m positive

Rejection

Rejection

Rejection

Shut down

Do not advance

Red light

Red light

Red light

Walk away

Take away

Your heart

Your body

Shut it down

No attraction

Get away 

Save your self

From the 

Diseased

But wait

It’s only me

I’m still here

Can’t you see

Me

I’m undetectable

Strange how parts of words work

UN = Not

What part of me is missing

That I became not detectable 

My first pandemic

Not so long ago

Still

Here

Not alone

We

Survivors

Traumatized 

Before

Trauma

Counted

The parts

Not measured

Unimaginable

How living life 

Stops

How being 

Romantically loved

Stops

When death sentenced

A decade

Spent 

Popping

Experimental 

Pills

Waiting

For the knock

Deaths calling card

Going to the edger

T-cells mostly gone

Full-blown

No defense 

Cancerous spots 

dappled dermas

Chemoed

To kill

New title

Disabled

Doctor said it had to be so

I sign the paperwork

Deliriously dying 

Terminal Illness

Government assisted

Poor 

There was no other way

Deadly health is costly

It’s a fortune

Passing

Slowly

Patiently 

I waited 

A decade

Being disabled

Fully abled

Stalled

As others advanced

Different pills 

Different side affect

Same Trauma

Same shame

Life moved 

Forward

I waited 

To die

A decade

Lost

Pills multiple

A

Z

T

Killers 

Lost their plural

Became one

Side effects 

None

A decade

Came and went

Then downgraded 

Chronic illness

A Bush president

A government move

Change the language 

Status changed

Loss the label

Disabled no more

Taken to court 

Me versus the US government 

The accusation

Fraud

Faked Illness

Bush’s court 

Accused me of faking 

A

I

D

S

Wanted

Payback 

Thankfully 

A white man

A crabby Judge

Appointed to his position

Read my labs

Maybe

I don’t know

I wasn’t allowed to speak

Only listen

Passing judgment 

Is always one sided

White man's rules

Laws

His judgment

His rulings

My life

Innocent

Found Innocent

Strange phrase

Found Innocent

A lost decade 

Of Life 

Diseased Disabled

Unretrievable

The hours spent

Tormented

Waiting

Death sentenced 

To be found 

Innocent

Still infected

Still diseased 

Still 

More 

Traumatized 

But Innocent

The verdict

His judgment

Passed down

Always down 

It goes

Shit flushed

Hellbound

Down Down Down

To Earth

Dying 

One day at a time

Every body

Is doing it

One disease at a time

Viruses

Come and go

Through people

All people

Monkey Pox included

The ones yet to be named too

And they are coming

Coming soon

To the living planet 

Most near to you

Who’ll be 

Next

Lepers

Black Plague

Outbreak

Epidemic

Pandemic

You know

I know

We know

People

Could be you

Could be me

We are all infected

By 

L

I

F

E

Why confess

Now?

I’ve reach

Meaning

Beyond my guilt and shame

Though I carried it 

It was not mine

Remember I’m innocent

Our government

Declared it

Bullshit

I was never guilty

In the first place

Humans are small-minded and cruel

Equal to their brilliance

AIDS aroused Fear 

Fear amplified hatred

Hatred caused divisiveness

Human Nature?

All I know is what I lived

Translatable

Transferable

Noncommunicable

Transformational

Awareness

Having

survived 

Plagues

Nearly

Fearless 

Compassionate 

Amplifying 

Love

Alive

Present

No longer

Waiting