Izzy Wilson
When the Epidemic Gets Personal
13 years old, but Wide Awake!
Told my counselor I am bi today.
Her reaction silences me for another 13 years.
Ryan White and ACT UP making headlines.
Sarcomas and withered bodies flash before us,
Then Diana held the babies and
A.R.T. rejuvenated life.
I cried for the gay men and babies, rarely seeing other representations.
Move on to my personal, compulsory heterosexuality. Somehow I broke out!
Got woke!
Contracted HIV.
47 year old librarian type.
Re-education–not a death sentence.
U=U Hallelujah!
One pill a day replaces 13.
And I finally realized that it’s my turn to ACT UP…. now!
Writing by Izzy Wilson has appeared in Atlanta’s OutLoud Magazine and on the International Bipolar Foundation blog. Wilson has published poetry and essays in both gender studies and social work textbooks. Wilson is a 2019 Fellow for Positive Women’s Network and is currently organizing housing for people living with HIV and trans displaced persons.
SUBMIT to Na(HIV)PoWriMo via our SUBMITTABLE site.
Join our mailing list to receive news, updates, and special offers from Indolent Books, the publisher of HIV Here & Now.
Here is today’s prompt
(optional as always)
Today’s poem recounts the poet’s (or speaker’s) experience of queer gender and sexuality from childhood to adulthood, and how those aspects of identity intersected with HIV/AIDS in the speaker’s own life. Write a poem about HIV/AIDS in the context of a personal coming of age narrative. You do not have to be HIV-positive or have had AIDS to write a poem like this—it can involve your experience of HIV/AIDS as something affecting a friend or loved one or something you learn about from media representations, art, or literature.