p.c. scearce
Ars Vitae HIV
i. results
were nights like here, muddled in summer’s sweat
opened by fans, breezed
, a prophetess either without a heart, or
without you—oh uh now I call him
him…
this audience doesn’t believe poetry—
doesn’t
, isn’t bringing much to me
anymore.
my language can’t trick myself to hitch
click the jams of doors or
these thoughts are because of him, of you.
those who’ve seen in waiting rooms and thus passed away,
i am awaiting my tests.
are minds in prognosis, ah the medical articles—
an audience, a year’s past filled by dis-
connects
—i’ll always know
where i am by the time I last saw him—see you.
was it easy for him/you to best the beat on repeat wrought-
out from an audible to tell me—there were/are
no goodbyes but that it could’ve
been one.
i murder the clinic with what litters the pavement
along with other
test results.
it is all i couldn’t have possibly known—can live
without a positive—now do.
who could lead this sparse liturgy of lovers i’ve kept?
who cares but me, or him—that’s you, idiot—
my constant return to emotionally
blame become declined to ever reside
on my couch / off my couch—
you/he did once
before
the results.
not three months long ago before
these results.
i try sitting in musical chairs when i get home—
each time,
they remain significant still like
i am attempting to shake you—no him—ah, but it’s you
again i run around and around
but no longer follow
myself.
where are you now so i can confirm suspicions…
it isn’t where he; it is i to mine to
maintain.
Poems by Phillip Calvert Scearce (p.c. scearce) have appeared in Screen Door Review and Euantes, among other publications, as well as in the anthologies Super Stoked: An Anthology of Queer Poetry from the Capturing Fire Slam & Summit (Capturing Fire Press, 2018), edited by Regie Cabico, and Lovejets: Queer Male Poets on 200 Years of Walt Whitman (Squares & Rebels Press, 2019), edited by Raymond Luczak. Originally from Danville, Virginia, Scearce, lives in Washington, DC.
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Here is today’s prompt
(optional as always)
Today’s poem has in its title the Latin phrase “ars vitae,” which means the art of life or the art of living. Write a poem about the “art” of living with HIV/AIDS, however you care to interpret that phrase.