VALENTINES
(morning noon night)
-------------------------------for Susan
photo © bob arnold
LOVE RAPI won't get no tattoo
wear no earring
put big holes in the lobes of my enlightenment
no
I'm still dressing in
slim jeans, blue work shirt, boots
just like I have for 6 decades no
no reason to change
cheap living
no tattoo either on my love
no spread tattoo just
below her waist like I
see regular office worker
young woman has when she
drops papers at the post office
and bends to retrieve
the same tattoo rising
out of her skirt
the same tattoo her husband
or boyfriend likes on porno sites
looks strange peeking out of
professional dress
get off my back about your dull
slacker and no intimacy ways of
not loving
give me love and buckets of it
kiss me right in public
hold my hand
have the erotic be neurotic
right in the every day
unblemished
unperformed
no posing, no airs
just the blue skies and eyes with no lies
MANY TIMES
There is the absolute way
Of doing it, and we have done it
Many times and again
How I will come to you
How you will meet me
The early morning sun
Perfect on the bed and the
Stripes in the Mexican blanket
Like blood, the sea, yellow iris petals
And it is a silly lovers ritual of ours
I hug you and you hug me and step onto
My boots and I walk you and me around the
Sunlit room, the way of patchouli in your hair
And your face smooth against my lips
Like the inside of your hands
US
Between Ives and Messiean you move and I move with you.
In one more stupid mall with cheap price CDs and three
hundred Sunday shoppers all with the same behavioral instincts,
what’s to look at? The ceiling is more curious, all suspended
with some panels complete, some open straight up to the no man’s
land of steel trusses and cheapness. I know when it rains it
rains in the book section, and wouldn’t you know? A leak in
the roof still to be found. Before we leave with our fix of
CDs Carson wants to take me back into the book section to show
me where he sits each time we come right in front of a rack
of comic books and he often brings real books to this chair.
Now I know where to find him. I remind him this is the best
way to use this place — read for hours on a rainy day respectful
of the merchandise but don’t buy a thing. How I move with you
is standing still, not even thinking of much; will it be a CD
Ives or Messiean juggling prices, and in green cotton dress
between racks you hesitate in its alphabetical organization,
tight waist and hips curve, a freshly and very fuckable look
between us.
