Life Sentence

From my book Misery Loves Company…

I think I love you, but you’ve got that HIV
but maybe this is not such love as it is
a strong infatuation or even a healthy lust
but… then… maybe not so healthy
since making love to you just might
give me a disease that makes the world
treat you like a leper, save for but
enlightened few — so few and far between —
and who’d still think twice before they’d take
the kind of risk I just might take with you
because you’re so beautiful to me
of body, mind and soul
and if it weren’t for HIV
we’d already be in bed
but the thought of needing latex
it kind of spoils things somewhat
no matter how much or if I love you
and I suppose that if my feelings
were much more clearly love
then it wouldn’t be so rough.

Just maybe, honey, maybe
it’s a blessing in disguise
this life sentence that you carry
your every waking minute,
for it will surely keep away
all those not worth your time:
the tacky and the shallow
and the ignorant and the callow
who’ll avoid you like the plague
and that cannot be so bad, right?

And yet your downcast look reveals
all that’s not much consolation
when one you so desire
gets that glaze of fearful eyes
and says “Oh look at the time!”
and says “I’ll see you later”
and quickly walks away
and leaves you standing there
wishing, hoping, praying
for God to get it over with.

But if you ponder it awhile
you’ll finally realize
they’ve done you a huge favor
and saved you lots of time
you’d otherwise have wasted
on one who ill deserves your heart
and I know it’s hard to see it
when you watch them fly away
while you mark the days left on your life sentence.