HER FINAL SHOW

HER FINAL SHOW

" She said it was a better way to die

Than most; she seemed relieved, almost at peace,

The stench of her infected Kaposi's 

Made bearable by the Opium applied

 So daintily behind her ears: "I know

It costs a lot, but dear, I'm nearly gone".

Her Shade of eyeshadow was emerald green;

She clutched her favorite stones. Her final show 

She'd worn them all, sixteen necklaces of pearls,

Ten strings of beads. She said they gave her hope. 

Together, heavy as a gallow's rope,

The gift of drag queens dead of AIDS. " Those girls,

They gave me so much strength." she whispered as 

I turned the morphine up. She hid her leg

Beneath smoothed sheets. I straightened her red wig 

Before pronouncing her to no applause."

The writer is watching her die peaceful in the hospital. Ifound

 

interesting that how she had on the sixteen necklaces from other

 

drag queens that had died from AIDS. The necklaces were the

 

strength that the girls had given her. Also, the writer straightened

 

her wig; the writer wanted her to die looking pretty like how she

 

wants to be remembered.  In the 10,000 AIDS Death in San

 

Francisco poem by Rafael Campo, talks about a particular patient

 

that he had saw dying. He connects to him because the man was the

 

same age as him.  Also, how he reflects by watching that man die

 

and how him being gay was not acceptable in Cuba. People you are

 

gay, lesbian, and transvestites should be able to come out and not

 

be kept in the closet because we live in a moderate world. People

 

should not be judge of their preference or giving less respect vs. an

 

average person.

 

The New York Times had published an article of the 10,000^th AIDS

 

death in San Francisco, and say “a gay Latino male in his 30s”.

 

The New York Times are saying that all the people that had died

 

from AIDS are gay and Latino. They should have given a more

 

been a respectful obituary poem, instead of just saying a drag queen

 

dies from AIDS.  Writers need to more caring toward report about a

 

death. If that person was part of your family, you would want a

 

more detailed report or obituary.