Drinking & Fucking

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Best part of a fuck lies in what’s revealed.
Not in the act: how taut's her skin;
Her hidden stores of steel and ink; or if
She shaves the mons, weaves the hair in braids; or how
She thrashes at the highest point of sin—
That’s for the birds.
The adolescent playground game
Comparing the specs of their secondhand cars
Who's driven 0-60 fastest, when;
And flesh is just flesh ten pints or so in.
It's what comes next. Wearing nothing but sweat—
Fix up a martini; get a can from the fridge—
Enjoy a lazy cigarette—
A line or a joint if your dealer’s come through
                                And get talking.
Her script you have read a thousand times—the jobs
And boyfriends, husbands, children lost;
Careers and marriages wrecked like her cars;
The flatmate's patience wearing thin—
Tick the boxes. Pro forma—just fill in the blanks.
Her excuses, ambitions—always good for a laugh.
Cos of course she'll deny it.
Cos of course she's a state—
Utter wreck in a bar on a Tuesday—but still
It's a phase. Things are tough.
But next year when I'm done
With the album; the novel; when I'm signed back to school
When I move out of nana's, get a place of my own—
I'll be better. Back on track.
Better able to cope—
And the rest of the patter—the castaway's hope.
Clinging tight to the wreckage, borne driftwood on tides
Threadbare in flotsam, near-naked, alone
By the bare bleak horizon—the desolate bride
Draped in weeds like a widow's—
Ersatz clothing quick-sewn—
Cos her skin in the sunlight will be burned to bone.
And she knows she's abandoned.
She knows she's betrayed
All her clan and her birthright for the men and the brew—
But she clings to the figleaf—loosely draped in her tales.
She’s not like those men, sat on benches, in parks,
Shameless as dogs, raising toasts to the sun;
Let it drink in the skinfuls, the full feral view.
She’s down on her luck, but soon back on her feet:
Soon dressed and upright, and beaming her smile.
You know very well her funambulist’s life:
Having lived it yourself, God knows for how long.
Her feet are firm-planted in the thinnest of airs
As her eyes dart about—oh she sees and despairs—
For some soft place to land. She’s fallen before—
So often she no longer bothered to count—
Always righted herself.
Soon back on her feet—
But the body’s a little more weary each time;
Little keener, each time, for the final defeat.
And of course it's great sport.
Watch her dance her burlesque—watch her writhe and cavort
Through libations of wine in the ashtray and tears
And the glimpses of tit and the gash—
And you glimpse something else.
Something just out of sight—
Knowing just what it is. Not the face or the name—
You’d never the courage to meet that thing’s gaze
In the dank-attic corners at the dead heart of night—
As it plays in the shadows.
Watch it dance in the shades—
Flitting forms in its witchcraft; in the formless display—
Hobgoblin and vulture; the spider, the crone—
But you knew that was dressing. Never showed its true face.
Mummy said there's no monsters—
Said there's nothing to fear—
Nothing's lurking in those black silent corners, my dear—
There's nothing there—just silence and black.
All in your head. Now you go back to sleep.
And in those twisted tangled limbs—
You see it plain. There's nothing there to fear—
The nothing in the flesh—
Held palpitating, naked in your arms;
Two silences that strike the heartbeat's heart
Each calling each—deep echoing the deep;
Immaculate in intertwining eyes—
Twin diaphanes illuming, glass on glass;
And quickening light inside that black morass—
Your brokenness and hers each other keep.
***
Alarms blare half-an-hour by the time you’re awake.
Wake with a start – what the fu– for fuck’s sake
The second time you’ll be late this week.
No time for a shower – you spray on some Lynx -
Hoping your sweat doesn’t overly reek
As it sweats out the poison; sweats out the night.
You watch as she dresses, unladders her tights
Mutters something ‘bout warnings; written ones now.
No hope that she’ll call. That’s her loss. Silly cow.
Besides, made up like that, she looks like a clown.
She’s an alkie, of course. You just need to cut down.