Today is World AIDS Day, and this post is duplicated on both blogs. Oh, and why not? Surely, the average sexually active heterosexual has seen through the ‘Gay Plague’ misnomer by now?
I have written several poems about HIV-AIDS, but so many readers have asked me to repeat today’s poem, how can I refuse? I can but hope regular as well as new readers will at least find it thought provoking. Moreover, for those readers who cannot access the Internet at home (and there are still plenty world-wide) it will save them browsing the archives under various relevant keywords. Some of you may recall that I read it on my YouTube channel earlier this year:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2zUUblt0ik
If the link doesn’t work, go to my channel:
http://www.youtube.com/rogerNtaber
and scroll down to Monument (2)
Some of you may also be interested in another poem I read from the same collection that I dedicated to DAMSET, an HIV-AIDS Educational Trust based in Bournemouth, but which expanded to embrace the whole of Dorset. A group of hardworking, dedicated people set about creating a memorial mural for people who have died of AIDS across the county; this not only involved going into schools and generating HIV-AIDS Awareness, but also many of the tiles on the mural were designed by schoolchildren. I feel very privileged to have been asked to write a poem for DAMSET which, to my surprise and delight, appears on the mural:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKzi9VRjuq0
or go to my channel and scroll down to ‘Bournemouth (DAMSET)’
For more information about DAMSET, a truly inspirational project::
http://damset.co.uk/
More often than not, gay and straight people alike (especially, but by no means exclusively young people) tell me they would ‘rather not know’ whenever the subject of being tested for HIV-AIDS arises. Personally speaking, I think this is a very selfish attitude. The HIV virus is not easily transmitted. Even so, it is still on the rise world-wide among people of both sexes and all persuasions. Once, when the British Government gave a damn about HIV-AIDS and there was a lot of Awareness promotion, a memorable heading used was:
‘Low risk is not no-risk.’
It certainly made me think, and although I practised safer sex, I’d go for a test every so often anyway if only to be on the safe side. I figured that if I had been unfortunate, I might as well go on medication and give myself the best possible chance of surviving as long as possible. More importantly, though, I could not live with the idea that I might unknowingly infect someone else. In addition, let us never forget that it isn’t only HIV-AIDS that can result from unprotected or less protected sex. Chlamydia for example is also on the rise and can leave a person infertile.
I try not to be didactic in my poems and this one is no exception. If it raises HIV-Awareness among readers, so much the better, but it is primarily a love poem.
THE TEST
Didn’t test to see if I was HIV positive,
I was scared,then my lover asked me outright
and I lied…
thinking I wasn’t really lying, believed
I was okay
but the lie began to haunt me more
each night and day,
especially when in my arms he lay
his body in my trust
I should find out, I thought, I must
have a test,
I can’t go on pretending like this
even as we kiss
that there’s no virus in me I can pass on
(as if I would)
but I cannot answer for the unknown,
need to find out,
be worthy of his love and trust
or we’ll never last
Eventually, I had the test, it was negative,
I was relieved,
then I asked my lover outright
and he cried...
swore he hadn’t known when we first met
but discovered since,
too scared to tell me in case I got angry
(as I’d been he might reject me)
so what could I do but hold him near,
plant kisses in his hair?
Yes, we’ve had the test, my love and me,
it set us free
from doubt and fear because, together,
we are strong,
can deal with whatever this life
dishes us…
beats treading on our dreams, left alone
and up against it;
above all its blessings, place trust
or love will fail the test
[From: On the Battlefields of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010]
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