You may know that AHF’s first hospice was called The Chris Brownlie Hospice, but do you know the man behind the name? The Chris Brownlie Hospice was officially dedicated to Chris Brownlie, co-founder of the AIDS Hospice Foundation and crusader for AIDS and LGBTQ+ activism, on September 24th, 1988. Speaking at the dedication, Brownlie said that the establishment of the hospice really tells the world that “we [people living with AIDS] have enormous courage; we fight not only the disease but the world…”
Brownlie was born in Farmington, New York, and had been active in politics in Los Angeles since the early 1970s, when he helped found the Los Angeles Gay Community Services Center. Since the mid-80s, Brownlie worked for a variety of AIDS-care projects, including volunteering for AIDS Project Los Angeles and the Minority AIDS Project. He was later instrumental in creating the Stop the AIDS Quarantine Committee with AHF co-founder and president, Michael Weinstein, in 1986.
They fought against bigoted politicians trying to limit the rights of those living with AIDS and those in theLGBTQ+ community. After winning this victory, Brownlie and Michael Weinstein, along with the rest of the AIDS Hospice Committee, switched focus on what Los Angeles County needed next. At the time, LA County did not have a hospice dedicated to those dying from AIDS. From there, he helped to found the AIDS Hospice Foundation through fierce advocacy and applying pressure to the County board. A prolific writer, Brownlie would often write for LGBTQ+ publications and penned a moving poem about his experience with AIDS.
In 1987, Chris Brownlie was diagnosed with AIDS. He spent his last days in the hospice named after him up until the last day, when he moved to his home in Silverlake on November 28th, 1989, and died of pneumonia due to AIDS at the age of 39. He was surrounded by his best friends Michael Weinstein, Albert Ruiz, Mary Adair, Grace Hengst, and his partner of 10 years, Phill Wilson. In explaining the dedication of AHF’s first hospice, Michael Weinstein said it is “because he is a representative of those in the community who have the spirit, courage, and grace to fight for those with AIDS.”
“AIDS has made me into an artist; every moment is sublime.”-Chris Brownlie
AIDS by Chris Brownlie
It is a whimper and a scream.
It is the brush of a branch on the screen of your window, a rustle, a rattle.
It is being in your center and being so far from your center
That you don’t know if you’ll ever find your way back.
It is relentless. It is daunting, a great mountain which you must climb.
It is sweating, bleeding, puking in ways you never have before.
It is pain you never imagined.
It is fear you never dreamed
It is grief you never guessed.
It is the frenzy of medicine.
It is too many visits to the outpatient clinic,
The two days in the hospital for tests,
The weeks for the treatments.
It is the doctor’s kindness, the nurse’s caring.
It is the doctor’s prodding, the nurse’s poking.
It is the manic need to make your mark,
To leave some worthwhile trace of yourself behind.
It is the shattering denial every time the symptoms of another infection begin to mount.
It is the loneliness, like the whistle of a train passing in the dark night of your soul.
It is the caring for your friends in ways you never have.
Intimate ways, horrible ways,
Ways that take more of your love that you never knew you had.
It is being there when the coma comes.
It is begging in your heart for some little piece of mercy.
It is going to the church, or the park or the beach to say:
“farewell and Godspeed, beloved one.”
It is waking up wet, so wet, wetter than you were at birth.
It is having your skull split by its swollen lining.
It is changing your sheets because the stench woke you up.
It is anger, weird quirky anger,
That knocks you off your pins and makes you doubt your own judgments.
It is not knowing the difference between your needs and your desires.
It is being disoriented by the force of the great emotional wind.
Which is constantly blowing within you.
It is the fighting back.
It is the building of places to care for the living and the dying.
It is courage, it is honor, it is integrity.
It is people joining forces in a time of great need.
It is hope, it is sharing the burden.
It is people caring for their own and finding love.
It is surviving and believing in the future.
Even when we are hurting more than we have ever hurt before.
It is bearing the unbearable,
Enduring the unendurable,
And hoping in the face of hopelessness.
It is the hunted look in your loved one’s eyes when a new crisis begins.
It is mourning together.
It is holding them in your arms and in your heart.
It is crying because your heart is breaking over leaving them behind. It is the sweet pain of knowing that you are dying. And the overwhelming sadness of those who will kiss you into their dreams.
It is wail.
It is a howl.
It is beyond our grasp.
It is awful.
It is awesome.
It is AIDS.
Have an archival request? Fill out the form here.