Gil Cuadros (1962–1996)

This collection, half stories and half poems, was beautiful, heartbreaking, and brilliant.
Cuadros started writing after being diagnosed with HIV in 1987. His writing has a raw edge. There is a touch of mysticism and a poetic quality in the stories, while his prose poems have more of a storyline at times. Cuadros blurs the lines, exploring gender roles in Mexican-American culture and the progression of HIV in his partner and then himself. I cried several times reading this short collection, all the more because I know this was all Cuadros wrote before his death in 1996, at the age of 34. (Content warning for death, dying, and childhood sexual abuse.)… (meer)