Lisa Andrews
Your Stories

I did not think the book of you would be done so soon.
I saw you as endless—multivolume, a set. You were the novel,
the book to which I could always turn, a story I could open
on any page, the way they say old friends can always continue
the conversation, pick up wherever they’ve left off, the way
that afternoon in the sudden rain, you welcomed us as if
you’d been expecting us all along, and the heavy rain
had been no accident at all, but a plot device, so that we
might sit by your fire and listen, as you told us your latest story—
screenplay, science fiction or script—back when all of us were young,
and I was almost careless in the driven rain.

Lisa Andrews is the author of Dear Liz, forthcoming in spring 2016 from Indolent Books. Her poems have appeared in Gargoyle, Mudfish, Painted Bride Quarterly and Zone 3. While completing her MFA at NYU, Lisa worked with poetry students at Goldwater Hospital and Bayview Correctional Facility and taught in the Expository Writing Program. Chosen by Dael Orlandersmith as a recipient of the New Voice Poetry Award from the Writer’s Voice of the West Side YMCA, Lisa has had residencies at Blue Mountain Center, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts and the Vermont Studio Center. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, artist Tony Geiger.

This poem is not previously published.

Emily Dickinson
Because I could not stop for Death (479)

Because I could not stop for Death—
He kindly stopped for me—
The Carriage held but just Ourselves—
And Immortality.

We slowly drove—He knew no haste
And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For His Civility—

We passed the School, where Children strove
At Recess—in the Ring—
We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain—
We passed the Setting Sun—

Or rather—He passed us—
The Dews drew quivering and chill—
For only Gossamer, my Gown—
My Tippet—only Tulle—

We paused before a House that seemed
A Swelling of the Ground—
The Roof was scarcely visible—
The Cornice—in the Ground—

Since then—‘tis Centuries—and yet
Feels shorter than the Day
I first surmised the Horses’ Heads
Were toward Eternity—

Emily Dickinson (1830–1886) was born in Amherst, Massachusetts. Fewer than a dozen of her poems were published during her lifetime. After her death, her sister Lavinia discovered a trove of nearly 1800 poems leading to the publication of her first collection in 1890. Until Thomas H. Johnson published Dickinson’s Complete Poems in 1955, her work was considerably edited and altered from its manuscript form. Along with Walt Whitman, Dickinson is now considered the bedrock of modern American poetry.

Catherine Martens
Rewind a Positive Life

Can you believe it 17 years living as a positive female I’m sitting here on my bed just rewinding my life the last 17 years I had my ups and downs my mountains to climb my oceans to swim I hit rock bottom but I got myself back up again I found the strength in me I found the strength in the Lord. What a trip this has been. People ask me every day how did you get here in life, this very moment. I respond with this is how it all began…

At the age of 18 I was raped and beaten by someone I thought was a friend someone I trusted someone I had faith in well he turned out not to be a friend he was the devil as evil can come he kept me prisoner in his house raping me and beating me over and over again for three long days till he finally passed out I ran I ran so fast I wasn’t looking back I ran for blocks no shoes no coat just a button-down shirt I found as I ran out the door it was cold and at least four feet of snow I didn’t care I wasn’t stopping I kept running till a police officer saw me and took me to the hospital after being examined the police officer came in and started asking me so many questions I was scared and afraid what was my mom going to say and my boyfriend how do I tell him I couldn’t think straight I was going crazy in the end the guy was found guilty and sentenced to 25 years about four years into his sentence the Brooklyn D.A. called me to tell me he was killed in a prison riot. I didn’t feel anything I wasn’t happy or sad I felt cheated I had to live life remembering what he did and he doesn’t have to. A few months passed and I found out that I was pregnant the timing had me unsure if my boyfriend of a year who stood by my side throughout this whole ordeal was the father or was it the guy who raped me. Back then I was a strong Catholic and decided that I would have the baby my boyfriend said it didn’t matter if he was the father or not that my baby was his and he would raise the baby as his own.

Five years later we gave birth to a baby girl we were the all American family we both had jobs a nice home two wonderful children a boy and now a girl we had it all until my boyfriend got sick and had to go into the hospital he had pneumonia and TB. Turns out he tested positive for HIV right away I was tested and I was negative I chose to stay with him I loved him and he stood by me when I was raped. Life started to get hard he couldn’t work no more and I had to quit working to care for him and the kids three and a half years later he passed away from pneumonia we had ten beautiful years together we loved each other to death and we had amazing kids. I wouldn’t trade a moment we shared together for nothing. I will always have my memories of us.

A year later I decided it’s time to make a change and we moved to long island in hopes to start a new life. Two years later I met someone who I married after dating for seven months and thirteen months later I got pregnant with my third child when I was six months pregnant I was called into my doctors office she said she needs to talk to me about some tests I had I asked for an appointment but she insisted on it ASAP it was Christmas eve of 98 I remember it clear as day I walked into the office and my doctor was already there and so was my nurse I had a seat and I remember my nurse placing a box of tissues in front of me and the doctor started to tell me I tested positive for HIV what you’re wrong I always get tested you know that you have been testing me for a couple of years now I was six months pregnant and HIV-positive what did this mean how, how could this be I never had sex with no other guy except for my ex who passed away and my husband turns out he knew he was positive and decided not to tell me my life was falling apart again the doctors put me on meds right away and because they did my daughter was born HIV-negative I could no longer love him and the sight of him just got me sick to my stomach I really hated him for taking my right away he made the decision for me when in fact he had no right I wanted a divorce and he would not give me one he would not let me leave with my daughter they told me I could go but she was staying and if I tried to go he would stop me so for the next 7 months after my daughter was born I lived in hell with him until one day he was stupid and committed a crime he went to prison for 7 years I was relieved when I sat there in the courtroom and heard the judge say the sentence I felt a relief in my body of peace I knew now I can get away and start over again.

Now here I was a mother of three who is HIV-positive starting over for the second time I was scared I was afraid I felt shame I was embarrassed I didn’t know how to tell my family or my friends I didn’t want them looking down on me judging me blaming me my mom she cried when I told her but she stood by my side all the time most of my family stood by my side my friends as well I couldn’t stay in the house no more it reminded me of my husband too much so I took my three children and moved to a different part of Long Island.

Two years later I was on my way to work it was 8:46 in the morning when I stepped off the elevator on the 78th floor of the North Tower of the Twin Towers when the first plane hit us I didn’t know what hit us I didn’t know what was going on all I know I was in pain I was scared people crying there were dead people next to me hurt people all I know if I could hear my children calling me calling out mommy please come home that is all I remember I woke up in the hospital I had a broken shoulder and a broken leg and a lot of cuts and bruises but I was alive and I think that was because of the will and love of my children. I can’t say I am recovered because I always have nightmares if not about 9/11 then it’s about my rape or the betrayal of my husband.

A few years later I was diagnosed with HPV and vulvar cancer. Then five years later I was diagnosed with cervical cancer just this month I was diagnosed with a cancerous tumor on my spine. And through everything I have gone through I am so grateful to be here still. I am a fighter always was always will be. I am very active in my HIV community I am co-chair for our Ryan White part D program I have been chair and co-chair of a few different Ryan White committees I am a mentor for other HIV-positive people in my state I am a certified health educator for not only my state but nationwide. I have written grants and proposals to receive funding for programs to help support people living with HIV and AIDS I had the opportunity to attend five different conferences on HIV and I speak to youth groups and I have gone into our high schools to educate the teachers on the basics of HIV and AIDS.

I don’t believe I am being punished for anything I did I believe I am right where I am meant to be in my life GOD did not put me here to suffer he put me here to be his warrior and to fight this till the end and I might have fallen a few times but I always get back up on my own two feet and I spread the word you don’t have to feel ashamed or lonely we are here and we aren’t going nowhere. I am doing great with my HIV health care. My viral load is undetectable and I am strong and living a beautiful blessed life. Please don’t ever give up on yourself know your worth and share it. I am strong I am a survivor I am a warrior.

Catherine Martens is a single mother of three awesome children ages 29, 24, and 16. She is a proud grandmother of a beautiful 7 year old little princess. Catherine lives on Long Island where she works as a mentor and health educator for the state of New York. Family means the world to Catherine and over the years she has found that you don’t have to be blood to be family. She believes she is truly blessed to have the life she has.

The essay is not previously published.

Steven Sanchez
Certain Other Infections

Men who have had sex with other men, at any time since 1977 … are currently deferred as blood donors. This is because MSM are, as a group, at increased risk for HIV, hepatitis B and certain other infections that can be transmitted by transfusion.
—United States Food and Drug Administration, 1985—2015

The infections must be Prada heels, hooked
into the side of Hepatitis B’s protein coat
like some runway where I design
high end fashion nobody will wear
outside, like a peacock’s tail flared
out in a woman’s dress, gender confused,
making it impossible to sit. Or is it
the way HIV thrusts into human
cells, the way two men can push?
Neither can reproduce on their own.
We have RNA and phospholipid membranes
in common—the way we touch
the world, exchange information
through bilayers of fat and muscle,
unzip our genes, break hydrogen
bonds, and replicate into each other
to feel the rush of what we must keep.

Steven Sanchez is a Lambda Literary Fellow and was recently selected for a 2016 CantoMundo Fellowship. He holds an MFA in Creative Writing from California State University, Fresno and his poems have previously appeared or are forthcoming in Nimrod, Crab Creek Review, Tahoma Literary Review, and Assaracus, among others. He currently teaches at Fresno City College.

This poem appeared in Assaracus.

Soraya Shalforoosh
Nurse

What we scream when we mean “Mom” in a strange antiseptic room stripped of clothes and jewelry. Trying to show some dignity. “NURSE”   And she does not scare no matter how urgent the plea, she knows others have abandoned this corridor. So she brings in the food trays left on the floor outside the rooms.  She takes out the garbage at the end of her shift. She is the family that won’t visit. She brings her history though, once a tough girl whose own father died way too soon, when she was just a child.
Whose mom made gin in the bathtub to support the family, the farm wasn’t enough for the family of a young widower with so many children.

But she left that farm, that coal mining town in Pennsylvania. And when she could, she traveled by train, by plane, by ship, to Spain, to Gibraltar, to Morocco. She studied to be a nurse, a respectful profession she could have. But now, she is here in this room so many years later.              She prays on her rosary she could heal you. But she knows she can’t do more than this, bring you relief, if only temporary, and be here,
Nurse.

Soraya Shalforoosh is the author of This Version of Earth (Barrow Street, 2014). Her poems have appeared in Barrow Street, Can We Have Our Ball Back, Columbia Poetry Review, Good Foot, Iranian.com, Marlboro Review, MiPo Literary Journal, Octopus Magazine, Shampoo, Skanky Possum, and Unpleasant Event Schedule, among other journals, as well as in the anthology The Brink: Postmodern Poetry from ’65 to the Present (Yeti Books, 2005).

This poem is not previously published.

Maureen Thorson
Gold Star

The doctors,
before healing,
must first uncover
my disease,

a trial that proceeds
by means of tests
resembling
torture.

The difference is
I’ve signed
a waiver,
so as they select

the ideal needle
for each ordeal,
I can think,
I signed up for this,

can think it
as my vision slips
from the ceiling’s
cheerful posters

to the widening eyes
of the frantic tech,
can hear her wails
as I succumb

to the precise
adverse reaction
the waiver
warned about.

And after unblinking
minutes spent
watching there
my object self,

my fleshly self,
I pulled through
into what we
hoped would be

a future. I’m good,
you see, at tests.
I’ve never
missed a class,

not the ones
that repeat:
same jaundiced
lance, same

dutiful suture,
not even the ones
with the miniature
concrete tamper.

I’ll ruin
this curve yet,
110 percent
and extra credit

at enduring
whatever
has approval
at the end.

It’s a kind
of grading, after all—
I worry at my worth,
and worrying, dissect

the glint within
this subsumed self—
the sort I’d think
physicians

of your skill
would hurry to preserve,
or better still,
perfect.

Maureen Thorson is the author of two books of poetry, My Resignation (Shearsman 2014) and Applies to Oranges (Ugly Duckling Presse 2011), as well as a number of chapbooks, most recently The Woman, The Mirror, the Eye (Bloof 2015). She is at work on a book-length essay about everything. Visit her at maureenthorson.com.

Thucydides
Description of the Plague in Athens

Aside from the epidemic, the year 430 BC was said to have been remarkably free of sickness. The few cases of illness on record ultimately proved to be early cases of the epidemic. There did not seem to be any obvious cause of the disease. Rather, people in good health were suddenly attacked by violent fevers along with redness and inflammation of the eyes. The oral cavity, including the tongue and throat, became bloody and emitted an unnatural and fetid breath. These symptoms were followed by sneezing and hoarseness, after which the pain soon reached the chest, and produced a hard cough. Some patients had severe abdominal symptoms followed by biliary discharges of every kind named by physicians and accompanied by the greatest distress. In most cases an unproductive cough followed, producing violent spasms, which in some cases ceased soon after its onset, in others much later. Externally the body was not very hot to the touch, nor pale in its appearance, but reddish, livid, and breaking out into small pustules and ulcers. But internally it burned so that the patient could not bear to have on him clothing or linen even of the very lightest description or indeed to be otherwise than stark naked. What they would have liked best would have been to throw themselves into cold water, as indeed was done by some of the neglected sick, who plunged into the rain-tanks in their agonies of unquenchable thirst, though it made no difference whether they drank little or much. Besides this, the miserable feeling of not being able to rest or sleep never ceased to torment them. The body meanwhile did not waste away so long as the distemper was at its height, but held out to a marvel against its ravages, so that when they succumbed, as in most cases, on the seventh or eighth day to the internal inflammation, they had still some strength in them. But if they passed this stage, and the disease descended further into the bowels, inducing a violent ulceration there accompanied by severe diarrhea, this brought on a weakness which was generally fatal. For the disorder first settled in the head, ran its course from thence through the whole of the body, and even where it did not prove mortal, it still left its mark on the extremities; for it settled in the privy parts, the fingers and the toes, and many escaped with the loss of these, some too with that of their eyes. Others again were seized with an entire loss of memory on their first recovery, and did not know either themselves or their friends.

Thucydides (c. 460–c. 400 BC) was an Athenian historian, political philosopher and general. His History of the Peloponnesian War recounts the war between Sparta and Athens (and their respective allies) that took place from 431–404 BC. While the Greek historian Herodotus is often called the father of history, Thucydides is notable for his more rational approach to historiography that eschewed references to divine intervention and sought to analyze the causes and effects of human actions. The plague was a typhoid-like epidemic that seized Athens in 430 BC and returned in 429 BC and 427 BC. Thucydides himself contracted the disease, but recovered and was able to describe it based on his own experience and his observation of others.

This passage (Book 2, Chapter 49) appears in The Peloponnesian War (London, J. M. Dent; New York, E. P. Dutton. 1910), translated by Richard Crawley (1840-1893). This translation is in the public domain. The editor has made some revisions for style and clarity.

Melanie YeYo Carter
When I’m Gone

The immortality of my youth has been gone
for a while now
It stepped out on me for a virtuous woman
and for a child who still believes in heroes
The Superman in me has played with kryptonite one too many times
This heart has been the casualty of Russian roulette one to many times
And it makes me wonder where my words will go when I die
Will they have a chance to tell my parents
I never wanted them to bury me?
That I never wanted “GONE TOO SOON” attached to my biography
Me dying prematurely wasn’t a part of my plan,
but this decision was made for me

Someone please, tell me where my words will go when I die
When my hands are no longer able to shape shift them
into shooting stars for a dying wish
When my mouth is forever silent and mics can only cry out for me
When my poems can no longer breathe
or exist on my lips
I’m sorry, but this is a story ending I have no control of

Please tell me
where will my words go when I die?
Will they be able to comfort those brave enough to love me?
All expiration date and time bomb ticking
All memories and shadows
It was so unfair to let them love me
knowing, one day, I’ll have to leave
And I know everybody leaves
And I know everybody dies…
Just not like this
I find it hard to look at myself in the mirror some days
It’s difficult not to see the poison beneath this skin
I feel so trapped
Unable to walk away from a relationship I never wanted to be in
There is no love in this touch
Only death by the pound and it’s so heavy

I remember the first time I told you about my curse
I remember holding my breath, steeling my ego and covering my heart
for the rejection
But you saw something in me beyond what’s in me
So that is the answer to your question
That’s part of why I love you like hip hop and poetry

Sometimes, I feel so awkward when I say
“I will love you forever” or
“I will love you for the rest of my life”
I…I feel like I’m lying
I hope I’m not the last person you fall into
I hope your diving board heart is still available once I’m gone
and you can drown in love again

Please forgive me
I know this is so heavy but I have to get it out
while I still have the chance

Where will my words go when I die?
Will they die with me?
Or find a way to your chest and ribcage
so they can rock you into life on those rough days
How will I show you my life story is your life story if I’m muted?
How will I stand strong in your spine when you need me most
if my heart stops beating?

It’s going on five years, and I’m afraid
I guess that’s the running joke between myself and God
For years, I secretly didn’t want to live
And now, I openly don’t want to die
But I’ve learned we don’t always get what we want
I watch my life change after every needle stick
A white blood cell count the devil has attached himself to
And I hate this skin some days
this blood
this body
for being so mortal
And I know everybody leaves
And I know everybody dies
But not like this love

Not like this

Melanie YeYo Carter is a poet who became a spoken word artist one night in 2006 when, while stationed at Langley Air Force Base in Hampton, VA, she stepped onto the stage at a little restaurant called Mary Helen’s. By the time she walked away from the mic, YeYo had been born. By 2010, with the support of revolutionary poet and publisher Tichaona Chinyelu, YeYo published her first poetry collection, When Light Breaks Through (Whirlwind Publishing, 2010). Since then, Melanie YeYo Carter has become known for her raw and dynamic presence sharing the stage with the likes of  Tameka “Georgia Me” Harper, Red Storm, Ed Mabrey, heRO44, ThirdRail, Hope Flows and many others. Melanie is also active as an HIV/AIDS advocate.

CJ Southworth
An Explanation

when I let the guy go down on me
in the darkness behind the bar
while you were inside
talking with your friends
knowing what was going on

when I yelled at you
because I was tired of hearing
how loving a man was a curse
and I told you
that some of us were perfectly happy

when I went home with men some nights
and let them touch me
in the darkness of my studio loft
when I let some of them move in
and tried to build lives with them

when I told you I couldn’t talk to you anymore
that I couldn’t take another round
of you being with someone else
couldn’t stand to see you loving someone
who wasn’t me

all those times, in all those moments,
that was me in love with you
and trying to stop the hurt of loving
someone who didn’t love me back—
to fill the space inside my life
that was shaped like my fantasies of you

CJ Southworth was born Carlton D. Fisher in upstate New York. Under his birth name, he has published poems with Assaracus, Paterson Literary Review, Main Street Rag, Lips, and many other journals. His fiction appears in Glitterwolf magazine. In 2015, he began the process of legally changing his name to honor his mother and maternal grandparents, who raised him. Under his new name, he has won the 2015 Allen Ginsberg Award and published fiction with Jonathan. He is the Owner and Executive Editor of Jane’s Boy Press and teaches as an Assistant Professor in the English Department at SUNY Jefferson.

This poem appeared on the Tupelo 30/30 blog for December 2015.

Elancharan
Acceptance

I’m sorry
You have been
Diagnosed with HIV
These words
Will crush your soul
These exact words
Will force you
To feel fear
Your very existence
Threatened by a virus
A being
Invisible to our
Naked eyes
Infecting our humanity
Killing us off
Little by little
Pushing our organs
Beyond their limits
Pushing our immunity
Into abysmal pits

I’m sorry
For myself
I really am
Those late night parties
Drinking, dancing
Moving to the
Dangerous beats
My world spinning
Spinning out of control
Neon lights
Bubbling into existence
Warping my sight
Laughter
Laughing in my face
Into the arms of strangers
Men, women
Does it even matter?
Feeling my way
Through this sea
Of tender bodies
Into the bed
Of strangers
Making carnal love
Taking things to
A whole new level
Only to wake up
To missing partners
And sore all over
I break into tears
Knowing I could
Never wake up
To a lover
Who would stay
In bed with me

I’m sorry
For myself
When cigarettes
Are not enough
When alcohol
Can never
Get me higher
I’m popping pills
Sniffing powder
Snatching
Bloodstained syringes
From back alley pushers
Tapping veins
Tapping harder
Come out
Come out
Wherever you are
I’m pulling on
The belt
Tightening the leather
There you are!
Sliding in the needle
Breaking pale skin
Spilling some blood
My head is
Against the wall
Eyes trying to keep up
With the light
I feel the plastic
Slip from my hands
Taken from me
I do nothing
I do nothing
To resist

I’m sorry
There is no cure
I have to face reality
I have to accept the facts
I will not sit by, idle
But live life to its fullest

Death
Would come for me
Today, tomorrow, some day
But, until then
I would do all
In my power to
Prevent the spread of my horrors…

Elancharan is an exhibiting artist and poet. He lives in Singapore with his family and his cat, Leo. He has a strange love for all that is poetical and Sci-Fi. He is the author of several poetry collections (see his author page on Amazon). His poems have appeared in various international print and online platforms. To find more of his work visit him on Instagram @elancharan or Twitter @elancharang

This poem appears on Soundcloud.