The Prettiest Star

by Carter Sickels

The congregation is sparse, glaring gaps of emptiness. This is how it will be through spring and summer. Now that Easter’s over, people have absorbed enough religion to carry them through to Christmas.

In America, 15,000 people have died of AIDS, and there are almost twice as many infected. President Reagan still has not uttered the word. Queers, drug addicts, Haitians—we’re the expendable, the scourge. They want us gone. When we die, Christians and Republicans must go wild with applause—that’s what it feels like.

Brian told me that he learned a lot when he moved to New York about his own racism. “It’s way under your skin. We breathe racism.” He told me, “You’ve got to be open-minded. It’s the only way. You’ve got to be willing to see it.”

We live our lives not realizing which moments are special or which are ordinary—what will we remember, what memories will we try to grab onto, to hold close? All of these moments that make up a life.