#aids
“I love you”
push notification from my wife partially
obscuring an obituary for another soul
in a sea of death because of AIDS
I guess AIDS is funny now but
in a way it has always been because
gallows humor helps keep the sadness
and the insanity from ascending into
permanent scars
There’s always something
nipping at the back of our minds
queer was a slur not too long ago
and it still is awkward floating
through conversations about tolerance
and how things are “just better now”
Forgotten memories of bricks thrown
through windows and bibles used
as weapons while brothers and sisters
ask themselves if being out is worth
the invisible risk
They always can tell lurking
behind the screen posting hatred
laughing through the armor of
anonymity while doxxing, revealing
planning a ****** without involvement
because it’s a lot more convenient
if we **** ourselves
Jan 22
Jan 22, 2026 at 6:25 PM UTC
sleep curved miles of patched dead boys into me like a scythe.
their quilts were not mine to sweat through,
to drench nightly with my self.
but i cried out anyway.
said i needed stained warmth more than coffins ever could.
bare as they were.
prodigal as they were.
i turn aside in bed. i sweat it out.
sleep handed me its crowded city plots and boxes of
one-way ticket disownment boiled down
to an art exhibit of photographed bodies.
black and white bodies. end of life bodies.
i tore them into manageable halves.
their varied human pieces quilted themselves together onto the floor.
their eyes floated to land at my shoes.
i stared.
yet it was sleep who drew in
the fluttering array of lost bandanas dyed with every coy color
present on the rare days here
that always smelled more like mornings,
the colors peeking like barefoot children just around the corners of their smirking, drowsy city avenues after rain.
sleep dreamt me an after hours carousel.
the revelry of skintight garbage bags
brimming over with ****** boys.
lovely boys.
boys with a gleam.
faceless baby boys with sores like eyes,
full of their junk they
treasured, fondled, kissed
the little pound of flesh that was theirs,
they gave freely, bait and tackle
to swallow whole.
dust bowl dumpling soft.
pulsing expectance.
those skins underneath you’d discover pressed to an eternity of sorts
between two slurs of the same brick,
that its nightless club grime
mumbled disco sickly to me & him.
and i’d be on my knees.
by a bed, a river, a quilt, a pew, an avenue, a grave.
whatever useless dreams may come,
i always find myself there.
already knelt in every way i couldn’t possibly comprehend.
gravely, maybe beautifully-
beside another slumbering boy
too distant from life not to reach for.
Dec 9, 2019
Dec 9, 2019 at 12:42 AM UTC
1000 years have gone and went
What was Music to my ears
Is now
aids to my eyes.
Nov 17, 2019
Nov 17, 2019 at 12:27 PM UTC
if five minutes where dem
last five minutes of my life
if i died
in five minutes
i would
kiss my kid
hold on to my wife i'd
call my mom
forever
forever
forever
i wouldn't write a bit
i wouldn't eat a bit
i'd have lots of ***** though
i'd trip
i'd get scared
who would not?
placeless
Nov 17, 2019
Nov 17, 2019 at 10:55 AM UTC
Farrokh Bulsara a.k.a. Freddie Mercury
British singer, songwriter known universally
Confirmed he had AIDS and then died the next day
His music through Queen still rocks us all the way
Came a man from Zanzibar named Farrokh
Whose tastes were both flamboyant and baroque
For fame he was ready
Changed his name to Freddie
After his death millions still love this bloke
A Heathrow baggage handler prior to fame
Wrote a song about his favorite cat, Delilah by name
In his personal life he was very shy, gentle and kind
His life and times are “guaranteed to blow your mind”
Oct 19, 2019
Oct 19, 2019 at 11:46 AM UTC
Try learning that
You very first love
Is druggie
And has ***
When she used to be so brilliant
And loving
And full of life
When you two had
So much in common
That is pain
Right there.
Aug 31, 2019
Aug 31, 2019 at 11:20 PM UTC
“Maybe by a minute,
might’ve been a day.
Either way I escaped it,
was lucky either way.
Was it a random choice,
maybe geography?
Not sure why I escaped it,
why I live on to see.
The scourge that decimated,
took all that talent away.
Why did I survive it?
What am I left to say....
that has meaning or heft or gravitas for days?
Not sure what to make of it,
questions running through my mind.
I only know that I escaped it,
*** not yet the deadly kind.
Maybe by an hour,
who am I to say?
A.I.D.S. - the affliction of a generation, will it ever go away?“
Jul 24, 2019
Jul 24, 2019 at 1:27 AM UTC
I hope she gives you AIDS.
That'll teach you to **** anyone again.
I hope your **** falls off
I hope you're laying in a hospital bed where you
think of me before you close your eyes one final time.
Oh, did i mention I hope you get AIDS?
May 8, 2019
May 8, 2019 at 11:49 PM UTC
Today, I do not die
for in our time we have seen too many taken
Waken in me are their souls
Today, I will not die
for Frank, for Russell, for Betty June
too soon, too soon, my friends
Pay attention, I cannot cry
for Jeffrey, for Paul, my first kiss named Ray
They, who left amidst it all
Would not wish me to shed a tear
Be here, be here and know their names
James, and Donny and Danny, the twins
Great possibilities gone forever
We, hardened more as each dropped off
check off each name and know
Nelson and Dean, Tony and Roy
Arturo, whose own survival story was cut short
Stuart, who never had his proper farewell
Toned down tears may well up
Still, do not give up for they watch us now
How could they be forgotten?
For Trashina with her unbridled moxie
for John whose brilliance matched how foxy
a paradox, never understood
Whoever you've known
Whoever you've loved, give undying respect
as wrecked were their lives for ours to survive
Out-and-out trials they saw
Shall have my most undying respect
My undying respect for them all
Nov 30, 2018
Nov 30, 2018 at 7:01 PM UTC
I woke up to screams from a stolen razor.
Where is it?
It was a loud scream.
The end comes swiftly,
anyway,
and,
if there are no razors around,
it comes even faster.
At the top of the mountain,
the anger flows to the valley,
and there is no scream.
In the valley, we wait.
There is a pull from a cigarette.
Small talk that is not small talk.
A man wheezes
A woman wonders where she'll go tomorrow
it comes out as a laugh
and lightly in the background plays a song that can only be called the disease of the 80's.
We didn't need another.
But, thank you.
Oct 7, 2018
Oct 7, 2018 at 5:28 PM UTC
The time has come, for me to fray
the long lost fortune peace and joy
and i peep all around to see a ray
to give me hope and stop to cry
in the face of dispair, i will still try
it feels like hell and i need to fly
am about to burst and am full of thought
then if she left to me its draught
the touch of her hand and a kiss so hot
swimming basking and the fish we caught
fear and doubt with love we fought
she always escaped to what we ought
then came the insighter and he seemed brighter
taking her out and treating her better
Using a phone when i used letters
things were hard especially with a competitor
forgot me complete together with her litter
it seemed to her there was nothing sweeter
after utelizing the better of her best
he disposed her and then left
she had some pain in the chest
when she came in serch for rest
she was mine but we had to test
to avoid being hung like a nest
A drop of blood and a little buffer
recalled how our children would suffer
if through ignorance our life was vapour
my test was a line and my partners twice
why would life be so very unfair?
her episode was so shortlived
yet she left me huge a burden
to the kids we had i was both parents
just be cause she wouldn't heed
even doctors advice on adherence
all in all i had to say goodbye
coz she was mine for the time we spent
what i am now going through
is a fruit of ignorance and disobedience
my urge my prayer,
that not one falls into the same
it's so easy to say that,
lets avoid the idea of shame
by first escaping the blame
by keeping ourselfs tame.
Sep 15, 2018
Sep 15, 2018 at 3:00 AM UTC
My heart cries
The cries hurt
My beloved love gone
Love buried down and deep
Six inch never to bloom.
Once a lovely vase
Beautiful and fascinating
Till knocked down
By a ravaging missile
Missile with a burning heart
Ready to famish full family.
Deep inside my heart weeps
It is shattered
Broken and separated
Tattered
I wish for someone to mend it …
I hope a Guardian Angel will come along
One day
One century
Just to comfort my bleeding soul
Blood of tears.
Fast and furious she will come
A walking succubus you may call
Ready to ******
And drop you to dying hell
She will expound the pleasure
But later suppress your life
Then isolates and disappears
Moves on to another miserable soul.
My heart cries
It hurts indeed!
Bitter like gall.
She continues her profession
Capturing my loved ones
Bruising my life
Oh Dear!
August 26, 2015
Aug 29, 2018
Aug 29, 2018 at 7:57 AM UTC
Static crackling ecstatically; manic pop
Transistor hissing and spitting; sideboard atop
First when there’s nothing…
But a slow glowing dream…
Pirouette such as whirling dervish makes
Adolescent prancer twirls; leg warmer fakes
All alone I have cried…
Silent tears full of pride…
Breathless incantation; future forged in dance
Performance fascination; leap upon the chance
What a feeling...
Bein’s believing…
Neon flashes bedeck wrists and bonce
Peers laughter flash like fire; a ponce
Take your passion…
And make it happen…
The music shields, deflects. Antacid; taunts abate
Rhyhmic dreamer energized; blind to all the hate
Pictures come alive…
You can dance right through your life…
As Bergen-Belsen ghost yet still aware
Lost dreamer segues silently on fetid air
Bruised and battered, I couldn’t tell what I felt…
I am unrecognizable to myself…
Shuffling as garish Geisha; white but not with paint
Breathless as fifties bombshell; heaving sick and feint
At night I could hear the blood in my veins…
It was black and whispering as the rain…
With steel partner; straight firm and slim of hip
Rigid in rigor’d waltz; moving labouredly with drip
I walked the avenue, ‘til my legs felt like stone…
I heard the voices of friends, vanished and gone…
Faithless rusting engine combusts toxic blood
Failing sack of sinew lies where dancer stood
Night has fallen, I’m lyin’ awake…
I can feel myself fading away…
Monotone white noise; assuring beep
Dancer dreams in endless sleep
There was a time when men were kind…
There was a time when love was blind…
©pofacedpoetry (Billy Reynard-Bowness – 2018 – All rights reserved)
Acknowledgements:
1. Flashdance… what a Feeling (1983 – Giorgio Moroder, Keith Forsey & Irene Cara)
2. The Streets of Philadelphia (1993 – Bruce Springsteen)
3. I Dreamed a Dream (Les Miserables – Claude Michel Schonberg, Herbert Kretzmer & Alain Boubil)
Aug 24, 2018
Aug 24, 2018 at 8:28 AM UTC
Long have I searched for answers,
Met not one that knows
Over different lands and waters
This quest takes me high and low
The furnace heats up and I cannot bear
But clutch my heart with silence and tears
A thin line between love and hate,
Many have died in faith or is it fate,
For things they believe or things they want to believe,
Many talk, many walk, many more fear,
But in those last moments, they take it all in silence and tears.
First it was love, now it is hate,
Vengeance burns red in her heart like hells gate
Who could she tell, who would believe her
Weak and helpless she succumbs to her father
Who always has his way and ties her to a chair
Here she cries every night...In silence and tears
Another day, another lay- he would say
Little did he know there was a price to pay
Now he lays helpless on his sick bay
Another passenger on the broad way
If only he’d known there was something to fear,
He wouldn’t be here, watching them – watching him
In silence and tears
In my darkness I see the light,
Blazing hot but not blinding me eyes
Now, I remember it was sometime in March
It must have come from her smile
The kind that puts color on a black heart
With only a name she leaves me in silence and tears.
Mar 7, 2018
Mar 7, 2018 at 5:23 PM UTC
Miami, 1989
The moving vans
keep on the go in
this little neighborhood.
The rental companies
make special mailings
advertising low rates on
half-day rentals.
They know.
Their advertisements are practical
and somber like a funeral home bill.
On Sundays,
the men fill one house
and then another.
Their slow procession
cuts along the sidewalks,
moving between the houses,
as if among tombstones.
From the houses, they carry
stacks of books under their arms,
strap end chairs to car roofs,
fill trunks with tennis rackets and roller blades,
and beach chairs that sometimes spill last summer's sand
over a black carpeted spare tire.
You can walk into any house here
and sit on a dead friend's sofa,
watch a dead man's TV,
eat breakfast
at a dead lover's table.
You'll water a fern that survives him.
A time or two, usually just after the funeral,
you can look over at a chair,
and see him in it.
You can listen to a record
and hear him da-da-ing along.
You can read from a book
and see him in his chair
the book laying open on his lap,
as he nods in and out of sleep
and back-lit by a shimmering
Sunday afternoon.
Other times can you drink
from a pink flamingo coffee mug
and see him sitting cross-legged
on a tightly-cornered bed,
with bruise-purple blotches
spread like storm clouds
across his tight, pale scalp,
his dark eyes resting at the bottom
of their sockets, like sunken ships,
as the jagged corners of his bony body
break the surface of bleached white blanket.
But soon enough,
the visions stop.
That chair
becomes any chair.
That book
becomes any book.
Around here,
Sundays are moving days.
The rest of the week
is for dying.
Aug 13, 2017
Aug 13, 2017 at 3:51 PM UTC
It’s common knowledge that nobody dies of AIDS,
it’s the common cold or bronchitis or some other infection
that annihilates the broken immune system.
Alternatively, people with AIDS die
of suicide.
I didn’t even consider suicide an option
until you bolted your front door twice
and strung your neck up with a rainbow silk tie.
I don’t have AIDS,
I don’t even have the common cold or bronchitis,
but I do have a long gold cord under my bed
coiled up like a snake curling around its own head.
I do not want to die today, but I checked tomorrow’s forecast
and it sounds like the perfect day
for my madness to burst outward in hot yellow rays
as I choke on my own grey spit
and fatal sins.
Jul 6, 2017
Jul 6, 2017 at 12:34 PM UTC
A secret, forbidden.
Lurks through alleys,
hidden.
An icy breath tickles your chest, while
cerulean flames engulf the night.
A cancer, spotted.
Carves a pathway,
clotted.
Jaundiced rooms ebb and flow, purple
tide pools that dejectedly erode.
A pariah, banished.
Whispers to loved ones,
vanished.
Cannot ignore this chemical ***** golden
glitter still speckled throughout her hair.
A human, forgotten.
Splayed on couches,
rotten.
A look of surprise in his childlike eyes, milky
white oceans that lull him to sleep.
May 15, 2017
May 15, 2017 at 4:39 PM UTC
Seven Sins
Our body knows from within,
Was it... what was left of my lipstick stain?
From the lust and passion that burns in our soul's remain.
Or the constant thought of someone else, whose *** is that of the same,
My husband will **** you, 'cause you're the blame,
Being with a beautiful woman behind his back, and I
don't even know her name,
Why does it feel so good to be bad and have no shame?
Is it a test or just a friendly game?
I'm sorry to cause anyone pain.
I can't stop seeing this girl with no name.
Soon she captured all of my time,
Wasted days on lustful nights,
Without remorse or regret,
It seems my family at home I'd soon forget.
I started noticing her quiet sin,
When she invited others to join in,
I didn't want to do it, but she said it'll be okay it'll never happen again.
But it did, a different guy every time.
What am I doing, I'm losing my mind,
I look in the mirror, my eyes hollow and dark, my skin is pale and pink,
No wonder.. she was pouring powder from a capsule into my drink,
What is going on, I feel so clouded and can barely think
I felt encaptured in a mental place from where I couldn't escape,
I was willing, so they can't call it ****
If I'm supposed to learn from this, then it's too late,
I need to lay down, this sickness I can't take,
Stumble to the bed where i just want to sleep,
Something's making me really weak,
My husband found me, banged on the door til it broke,
The place stunk of ***** and clouded smoke,
He brought his gun and yelled "what did you do to my wife"
Lay in his arms as he carried me with limp and lifeless legs,
With a cigarette in her hand, points to me and says...
"You should have read the rules before you played,
Now you're going to die with AIDS,"
My husband stopped, looked at her and said,
"No one's going to miss you when you're dead,"
Put his finger on the trigger and shot her in the head.
Now my kids live without a mom, and my husband without a wife,
Seven sins couldn't keep me alive'
I couldn't go back, not even if I tried,
Started with meaningless *** and stupid lies,
To lust and *** with multiple guys,
Unfaithful deceit, to
Abandonment and defeat,
from illusion of **** to drugs and drink.
Life is more important than we think,
Before thinking your husband doesn't give you enough love,
I hope you read The Seven Sins I just listed above...
Dec 23, 2016
Dec 23, 2016 at 1:39 PM UTC
What they wear often in the public,
Never covers their essentials,
Such are the brief briefs.
What they don to party,
Same they wear to the beach,
Which they wear for the namesake.
Bluff they do their meaty sausages,
But they put them in their suckers,
Buff they look with their knickers.
Flaunt they do their ***** curves,
Finish they never on the beach,
**** they do in such parties.
They eat fat-burner to stay ****
Binge drinking they practise,
Worrying not about health.
Live like the Early man,
They live in the moment,
Risking AIDS and others.
Call me outdated,
Call me inferior,
Call me boring,
But I will never mimic them.
Dec 7, 2016
Dec 7, 2016 at 9:38 AM UTC
Daughter of an American restaurateur,
She breathed in fashion's golden age,
On the ramp, she was hot like wildfire.
A playgirl, she likely broke a million hearts,
Prancing on a hundred beds in her life,
Of course sharing with hundreds her arts.
Also engaged in doing drugs just so often,
Not caring even a bit about the sterility,
Oh, how she shared syringes and needles.
Be successful - but never ever like her.
Nov 6, 2016
Nov 6, 2016 at 2:04 AM UTC
-------
OK!
Giving up cigarettes on top of all this is a little too much
But
Don't quit smoking
The number one rule:
Never ever quit anything
Focus on what to do instead
Just don't smoke more than five cigarettes a day
And stuff your face and your mouth with ***** and snus or whatever **** you can find
But don't smoke
It will **** you
And a lot faster than you think
But it's still difficult
Especially if you got a constant death wish hanging around you
But I have faith
Occasionally
And I know by now
That I can **** myself
If worse comes to worse
But dying is easy
I know a lot of people who have died
And they have died
One hundred percent
And not all of them have been all that smart
You'd be surprised that they could eat with a knife and fork
But they died anyway
Nature knows this ****
You either die because you're sick
And trust me on this
AIDS does this to you
When you are so sick that you're dying
You're busy taking your next breath
And death is of no concern
Or getting well
Whichever way is the shortest
Or you get run over
Or something
And you're dead in eighteen seconds
Or you die because you're old
Not that living is all that bad
But you've been there
And you've done that
So it's not all that important anymore
But you perverts, who hardly survived your hamster dying when you were seven, want to know how to deal with the doctor saying you've got cancer
Terminal!
You already know what to do!
You smash everything in the kitchen
Then you go over to your neighbors
And smash everything in their kitchen
And then you cry for three days
And you probably find another kitchen
Repeat
Until you die
But you already know what to do
Life is a funny place
But it's not for weaklings
Let's play
Jun 9, 2016
Jun 9, 2016 at 7:14 AM UTC