knew (yes) knew

That phone call
(so dusty in that room)
and all the filing cabinets locked.

I hung white washing in the blinding sun,
felt my bleached eyes
sweat with the light.

Later we sat around formica and raw
sugar in a pouring device. Tea always goes bad
at cafés with strangers.

Does he take into account? Does he, anymore?

I wondered about desire and how
kissing on the mouth makes snakes
slither in the dermis. Old droplet asps.

I can not like it face-on this week or, intermittently, theses decades, however

the edges of your mouth are like havens
of dimpled silk-paper. A phone rings. It’s:
The Sound of Embarassment.

When I used the word shame, you didn’t laugh and didn’t smother one.

Something’s hurled me far, far from you
towards the sun. I haven’t said:  I might be
afraid. But you know, you knew.

(The fenugreek, cabbage and fresh curry leaves
were eaten on laps in a clean, bright bed.) It
gets too easy to long for bad desserts again.

In the steel kitchen I stood, I think, and told you. There was a way I was standing. Can only remember legs and feet. Not words. Doesn’t mean anything. Except that now I know

I had good reason.

The dog shat and traipsed the vomit
but it wasn’t his fault. I recall the careless death
of a friend’s pet. Outrage and hiccup blubbering.

‘Is that why you’re gay?’
(She works with old people. Doesn’t
mince her words.) Dunno, I say.

My face: a plastic rock:‘…older men are smelly and don’t take care of themselves.’ Or I think, maybe they only stink when the scent of too little caring is in their pores. Or caring too much for their (not-unusual-enough) unusual tastes. For others’ beginnings. Small wrists and waists.

We all want women. And children are so
vanilla, smooth, perfect and often (you know)
‘splendidly intellectually precocious’.

That smile of his, and nervous chuckle
knew (yes, knew)
it was the wrong thing.