Make me laugh/cry/think for World AIDS Day
December 1, 2011 12:26 PM Subscribe
What are the best, most moving speeches, images, or articles on the internet about or related to World AIDS Day?
Mark Doty: The Embrace
You weren't well or really ill yet either;
just a little tired, your handsomeness
tinged by grief or anticipation, which brought
to your face a thoughtful, deepening grace.
I didn't for a moment doubt you were dead.
I knew that to be true still, even in the dream.
You'd been out--at work maybe?--
having a good day, almost energetic.
We seemed to be moving from some old house
where we'd lived, boxes everywhere, things
in disarray: that was the story of my dream,
but even asleep I was shocked out of the narrative
by your face, the physical fact of your face:
inches from mine, smooth-shaven, loving, alert.
Why so difficult, remembering the actual look
of you? Without a photograph, without strain?
So when I saw your unguarded, reliable face,
your unmistakable gaze opening all the warmth
and clarity of you--warm brown tea--we held
each other for the time the dream allowed.
Bless you. You came back, so I could see you
once more, plainly, so I could rest against you
without thinking this happiness lessened anything,
without thinking you were alive again.
posted by ryanshepard at 12:48 PM on December 1, 2011
You weren't well or really ill yet either;
just a little tired, your handsomeness
tinged by grief or anticipation, which brought
to your face a thoughtful, deepening grace.
I didn't for a moment doubt you were dead.
I knew that to be true still, even in the dream.
You'd been out--at work maybe?--
having a good day, almost energetic.
We seemed to be moving from some old house
where we'd lived, boxes everywhere, things
in disarray: that was the story of my dream,
but even asleep I was shocked out of the narrative
by your face, the physical fact of your face:
inches from mine, smooth-shaven, loving, alert.
Why so difficult, remembering the actual look
of you? Without a photograph, without strain?
So when I saw your unguarded, reliable face,
your unmistakable gaze opening all the warmth
and clarity of you--warm brown tea--we held
each other for the time the dream allowed.
Bless you. You came back, so I could see you
once more, plainly, so I could rest against you
without thinking this happiness lessened anything,
without thinking you were alive again.
posted by ryanshepard at 12:48 PM on December 1, 2011
It's been around so long it seems old-hat, and because of treatment options, it's not quite as devastating to today's world, but you cannot consider a discussion of the most moving of images about AIDS without The Quilt.
I sewed many, many panels for friends, and I can't see even stock photos of it without looking for them.
posted by xingcat at 12:51 PM on December 1, 2011 [1 favorite]
I sewed many, many panels for friends, and I can't see even stock photos of it without looking for them.
posted by xingcat at 12:51 PM on December 1, 2011 [1 favorite]
For something a bit more light-hearted, I recommend this mythbusting photoset from Bad Reputation: Markgraf's World AIDS Day Rampage. (Markgraf is a friend of mine, but he also has very nice boots and Facts, so I would link to this anyway. I learnt today that some people think you can catch HIV from a fish pedicure. Huh.)
posted by daisyk at 1:06 PM on December 1, 2011
posted by daisyk at 1:06 PM on December 1, 2011
Seconding xingcat. Sweet Honey in the Rock's song about the quilt never fails to move me. It's playing in the background of this (grainy) YouTube video tribute.
posted by argonauta at 1:10 PM on December 1, 2011
posted by argonauta at 1:10 PM on December 1, 2011
The (super awesome and amazing) Positive Women's Network has a series of videos from positive women. Also The WELL Project.
Occupy Wall Street/VOCAL protest today.
posted by gingerbeer at 5:04 PM on December 1, 2011
Occupy Wall Street/VOCAL protest today.
posted by gingerbeer at 5:04 PM on December 1, 2011
I read the book Man With Night Sweats, or at least a portion of it, every World AIDS Day
The Man with Night Sweats
I wake up cold, I who
Prospered through dreams of heat
Wake to their residue,
Sweat, and a clinging sheet.
My flesh was its own shield:
Where it was gashed, it healed.
I grew as I explored
The body I could trust
Even while I adored
The risk that made robust,
A world of wonders in
Each challenge to the skin.
I cannot but be sorry
The given shield was cracked,
My mind reduced to hurry,
My flesh reduced and wrecked.
I have to change the bed,
But catch myself instead
Stopped upright where I am
Hugging my body to me
As if to shield it from
The pains that will go through me,
As if hands were enough
To hold an avalanche off.
Thom Gunn
posted by PinkMoose at 12:21 AM on December 2, 2011
The Man with Night Sweats
I wake up cold, I who
Prospered through dreams of heat
Wake to their residue,
Sweat, and a clinging sheet.
My flesh was its own shield:
Where it was gashed, it healed.
I grew as I explored
The body I could trust
Even while I adored
The risk that made robust,
A world of wonders in
Each challenge to the skin.
I cannot but be sorry
The given shield was cracked,
My mind reduced to hurry,
My flesh reduced and wrecked.
I have to change the bed,
But catch myself instead
Stopped upright where I am
Hugging my body to me
As if to shield it from
The pains that will go through me,
As if hands were enough
To hold an avalanche off.
Thom Gunn
posted by PinkMoose at 12:21 AM on December 2, 2011
Response by poster: I wasn't expecting so much poetry, but I like it. Thanks everyone.
posted by treehorn+bunny at 11:15 PM on December 2, 2011
posted by treehorn+bunny at 11:15 PM on December 2, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
He said he’d finally found his place.
And when I go to San Francisco,
Everywhere I look, I see his face.
Bud and I faced childhood
under stark Montana skies
And Bud, he seemed to always
have cities in his eyes.
He longed for possibility.
He lived to move away.
And he finally found his dream
in the city by the Bay.
Joe and I were best of friends
in our small time college town.
And Joe had personality –
what a campus clown.
His jokes hid deeper rivers
that bubbled far below
And he rode the current West,
where the rapid waters flow.
Lots of us had brothers there
who would love to show the sights,
And share the balmy freedom
of San Francisco nights.
They liked it so much more
than anywhere they’d been…
And we thought they would be there
When we made it back again.
My brother lived in San Francisco.
He said he’d finally found his place.
And when I go to San Francisco,
Everywhere I look, I see his face.
My Brother Lived in San Francisco
from Elegies for Angels, Punks, and Raging Queens,
lyric by Bill Russell, music by Janet Hood.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 12:30 PM on December 1, 2011