SORROW

ORISON

Don't let me die in the river,
like driftwood drenched to the bone
don't let me drown in the river,
don't let me die alone
don't let me die in the subway
a trashbag all i own
don't let me pass near mass transit
don't let me die alone
for those who die in clinics,
the cynics in pillared homes,
the poor and the poor little rich ones
whose money could not atone
for the scourge of dying loveless,
now let the Spirit moan,
while we light the altar votives
for those who die alone






on the edge of this frightful cup of tea
someone has lied to me
on the lip of eggs benedict and cigarettes
and good cheer
on the sunlight and the grin from ear to
ear i have been deceived
i have denied the tears in my eyes and the
ache in my ass
have resisted the pull of the long loneliness
didn't we forget that long before the ministers
of good cheer showed up
wise men heard the crying in the night and told
us
told us things that heal the same time they
rip the scar away
like father take this cup from me
like me buck naked, weeping, confessing
no longer proud
resting in a hope that cries are
heard
the restored word
jesus soggy in the garden saying
i am sick unto death
like Rumi dancing dervish saying
the only cure for the pain
is in the pain...

There you kissed me under that tree
in that spot you set your burning seal upon me

i am resolved to be a lover of men
a kisser of men
a stroker of them
i am resolved to be attentive to
them
i am resolved to pay attehtion to their small
smiles
under worn denim the roundness of thighs
the tentative look in their eyes
i am resolved to pay attention to
the buttons of men
in dress shirts for the office
the buttings in of insecure men
the buttocks of men, the miracle bottoms
and then
i am resolved to be a luster of men
a smiler at men
more patient with men
i am resolved to be lovely to them
and the lovely hair going up and down their arms
i am resolved to ce a connoisuer of men
a feeler of men
a romantic all night stroker of me
i have chosen to be a taster of men
a am not a lover of men
a licker of them
i have

MAGDALENE

oh saint magdalene
teach me to stand alone at the door
waiting the beloved
clothed only in my own sexiness
love and longing
teach me the strength of love
and love that's found in
standing
still and solid and wholly me
there is a trinity in this flesh
teach me the life and death of
jesus
in every curve of your sacred
flesh

at three o clock in the morning
it becomes apparent
every face of everyone i've met
becomes transparent
and i know that all we've ever done
and all we've ever been
so offensive
is to mask the truth that you
and i and we...
we are all terrified
this world we have made
our parents made
someone made
that was no begotten
is rotten with trap doors
and we have whispered poison into the ears
of our children as was done to us
if you were right here i would love you
i would pour you my last cup of tea
and we could sit right here till five o'clock
to see the sunrise
and brave another day

don't you dare tell me not to love your scars...

satiation
after the long untouching
the kiss
the body touch at last
who knew i was this fragile
i knew
i am just skin
and bones and
a mass of nerve endings
forget divine
i am simply trying to be
human

i don't know how to be coy anymore
cuteness will not save me
class does not matter
i am the screaming man and the
lustful crucifixion
i am forsaken by any kind of god who
sat in heaven with an old beard judging
he has forsaken me
i am with venus
i am with the wine on the sponge to my mouth
i've no class, i am open, spread eagle
come with your holy cock
it is the most sacred rock i know
fill me
split me
fuck me

day after day i cry out for some
type of touch
after the long lovelessness i am
a dry and weary valley
and living with myself
living all alone with every lust and
longing reverberating off these
cavern windows this body knows
this body waits
this body will take any naked body
any man stripping off in this kitchen
any kiss
ah
not true
this body waits for you
this seaside harlot
this venus priests is primed
waiting for the time when you
and only you will open the door,
and put myrhh on the door
and make me the door, and cross
the floor
and lean over, and place your seal on my brow
and on my chest
and on the nest of hair that awaits your diving bird
and its seed

now i know what it is like to come
through the long shadow
to wish to be touched, to cry
out for even a slap
to be slapped, to be kissed
to be abused
even to be used
there is, in this darkness
the deepest of needs
right now, in this lonely
season we are
all greedy
we are all the open wound
the open mouth
waiting for any food

all through the night i walk through brambles
i am not the first to do this
god knows not the last
everyone is together in this loneliness
everyone is together on this thistle path

FUCK ii

you search me and you know me and
how well you know me
you know how i long to get that touch
that push
that punishing kiss
that welcome invasion of the house inside
and you to slide
and slide
in ecstatic perspiration in creation
of the holy spirit
we make
when you take breaths and gasps and clasps
and pounding of fist
when you are inside me
and i'm in you and me and so
like bonded, pushing rushing
russian dolls with mouths open
in constant O
and muscles strained in the ow of opening
i want you
to crush me
i want you
to pound me into china
into the tomb
into resurrection
in the ejaculation
in the slower of the white
seed
is my only salvation

on the other side of bullshit
i love you
past the rubble of lying
and trying i cling to you
i cling with a looseness that is
not clinging
that is something like impossible patient
hanging, like the leaf that lasts all winter
i hold with the love
of holding
i flow in a secret part of me that knows no
fear
this part is so fucking secret half the time
she is even hidden from me
hidden from me
hidden
coming to you
echoing in you
all around you
sometimes when your hands touches mine
when i touch your bony bone, your clavicle
when i run my fingers across the whiter scar on
your infinite, thin white
coyote belly
cowbody belly
i think i know you
in the smelling of your breath
i think i know you
in the entrance to your house
i know i know you
past purgatory and taxes and religions
all about fear
and not about God i know you
and i love you
and i kiss you
and i hold you
and i squeeze you
and i love you
and i chide you
then i fuck you
and i love you

if you are graceful
if you will be graceful to me
then soon you will teach me to remember
to forget all the shit i've seen
america is a dream of piss and night
mares and strivign and disatisfaction
and all the noise noise noise we've heard
all this time time time
is just the result of two hundred years of
noise
two hundred years of prophets dressed in
bearskins and boys wih golden bibles
bulshitting about how in the woods they
saw the father and the son and the father
and the son told them they were lovely,
told him he ws holy
we all feel so goddamn ugly we just want
anyone to tell us we are pretty
we all feel so afraid we just want
anyone to sooth us
even if the soothing sucks
even if it sucks all our minds away
we just want it all to go away and
feel a little peace
at least
i pray
let me have the peace
of the lonely little old man in cuba
rolling his cigars

i want to be at the end of the
loudness
i want to stand on the edge
of foolish places
i want to sit at the end of
this light violence
right now we are at the strife
before the strife
now, i pray, let us not reach
the second violence
god, all of these little,
little bombs
may they be the end of foolishness
before its beginning
we are forgetting and forgetting
may we be remembering
love

this morning i think of you
in this bed beside me
the length of your emtire
body
i think of running my
hand across your perfect
scars, the loveliness of
the marred flesh,
kissing ever scrape
and scratch
and bruise, finding love
in all your hurts
surely these are the wounds
endured for my salvation

my mind has been troubled
i have been to weary, too busy, to frightened
to lost in the woods to even dream of
lusting for you
all of that, the kiss to your perfect skin
the hand on your lovely body
the unlocking of all the pornographic secrets
that save the world:
these have momentarily been lost
i wander in a strange land with
the recollection of a more glorious place
be the key of knowledge
in kiss, in touch, restore to me
the memory of your perfect ivory
body
of your read and brown paradise
your cocoa heaven
i need the leaven of the beautiful bedroom
to rise away from shallow talk of romance
and talk of this and talk of that
and chat and endless talk
the only thing we need right now
is the sweat
and the fury
and the fire
and in this salvation none of the old things shall
be left
nay, least of all, decency

you need to love me here
in the midst of fears and worries andstomach tightenings
every twitch of the floor like
lightning moving through me
conceived in dread and made on a bed of sweat
and suffering
i don't know any other way
no one knows any other way
everything we say has pricked hairs upon it
you need to love me
i need to love you
we need this strongly
we must do a thing. we must do....
something.
every little thing is falling down
about our ears
it would be good to say all is well, all is well
it would be...
naive
it would be...
simple
it would be... it will be our death
you and i botn know there is a disease
you and i both know every bit of music, every noise is just a bad
dollar store band aid for the diesease
you and i both know something must be done
bible reading must be done
or is fucking that must be done
or obedience
love...
love must be done
love is the fire that burns sickness
love is the iron that strengthens the beam
love is the only cure for the disease
you...
loving me

you have finally begun to kiss me
with the kisses of your mouth
it must be that you were always
doing this and i was always blinded
you have loved me with the love of
your heart and of your perfect
body and now i know i am your
perfect body and this
knowing
is love