Below is the poem my 8th-grade daughter Julie won second place with in a
contest sponsored by N.E. Place in Washington, D.C., for all students in
middle and high schools in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area.  As
you might expect, I'm *very* proud of her! 

The subject of the poster/poetry contest was "What's the word on HIV/AIDS?"

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The AIDS Quilt

So many names
So many people
The squares go on forever
I walk between the squares
Thinking about pain, families left behind
Fight, hold back tears
A mother reads a letter written by her daughter;
A name on the quilt
In tears she reads the first line
Her daughter was 14 when she died from IT
Sorrow and grief fill the air as the words pour from her mouth
A waterfall of sadness
Pain overpowers me, overtaking all other emotions
I walk around the squares
The last line of the letter filling my mind
"Why did it have to happen to me?"

Copyright (c) 1996 by Julianna Grogan-Brown