Persistent Voices
Prominent Bronx queer leaders select works from the book and share them with personal stories and interpretations. The reading is paired with dancer/choreographer Laura Shapiro's performance of Last Gasp! (First Draft) which considers personal end-of-life preparations.
Persistent Voices takes its name from a book of poetry that highlights work by writers lost to AIDS. Edited by Phillip Clark, the book memorializes legendary queer poets of a generation. Prominent Bronx queer leaders from the fields of literature, social justice, and performing arts select works from the book and share them onstage with personal stories and interpretations.
Last Gasp! (First Draft), created and performed by Laura Shapiro, uses mordant humor and talking as well as movement, video projections, and colorful costumes to consider personal end–of–life preparations within a perspective of possible planetary apocalypse and/or exhaustion.
The reading and dance performance is followed by a discussion on end of life planning that affirms our lives and deaths are worthy of consideration.
