The Blend(s)

Olive, oily skin,
calloused hands,
perfect flesh regardless of
unmistakable imperfections

I stare, longingly
I gaze at the body
Walking by, hot summer day,
Melted ice cream cones on sidewalk

Wondering when I can meet,
Lip lock contoured by carnal desire,
Sensory explosion in deep woods
While Mr. and Mrs. Smith
repeat tired heterosexuality
on Fifth Avenue.

Olive, oily skin,
Calloused hands,
For me banished
into some lonely corner,
forgotten by the Joneses,
names insignificant because of the blend,
reassertion of an already repetitious act.

I have it now,
Perfect flesh next to mine,
But we survive only in the Village,
Strolling by curiously blank statues
And black trans females
Teetering over us in three inch stilettos,
Our place, our relics, our realities
Marked by obvious erasure.

Lip lock contoured by carnal desire, we have
Our moment outside of the place
that christened a Movement.
But it does not last long.
Lingering on the present, wondering about the nights
We spent recently, abject moments alone,
Did we make any progress?
We question in thick humidity,
A ‘no’ the only certain answer
But we try to dream before

Spontaneous combustion—
we are not fit for this world—
stolen line from Amelie,
combustion of our possibilities

Replaced by haunts,
Image of his calloused hands
Dissolved into memory of
Stinging red marks from a
stepfather’s solid hand,
angry crusades against desire,
scripture re-interpreted with each slap.

Lachrymose twelve year old
Sitting on the bed nursing wounds next to
Undressed men, photos from somewhere,
Usually hidden in the secret box.
Wishing arousal would whither, away,
Out of his mind, into air, into water,
He flips the photos over, blank white
Against light blue sheets,
but nothing changes.
It never changes, he thinks,
Shame beginning to flow in, open window
On a warm spring night.

Replaced by spectres of my own,
The always-lingering heterosexual dream,
White picket fence in every frame, collapsed
on a wild lawn, mower sitting out rusted,
Discomfort intensifying as distant family asks about
Any opposites I have found away from home.
I say I am focused on my studies,
the only half truth I know that spares
me from the guilt of all-out lies

That morphs into fresh memory,
Only a month and a half old, of strolling
Down Decatur Street,
Cold winter day, blustery,
Wearing fingerless gloves and
Rainbow scarf, mark of a faggot
Of course, or I wouldn’t have been harassed.

Words, yes only words,
But random strangers,
Faces and bodies unknown to me
(no desire to turn around),
heckled me,
homo, homo, they repeated
as I continued forward, ever increasing pace,
turning a corner I wasn’t expecting,
concrete example of the queer path
bending to reproach, self and others
challenging notions of forward motion.

Reality once again,
Dreams, heap of fabric at the feet of
These experiences, new and old blended
Together, overwhelming desire for
Olive, oily skin of my companion stifled,
In the place where the closet exploded,
lip locked lovers pulled apart
For common purpose, pressing purpose:

We find the nearest bookshop,
Grabbing notebook and pen,
Sitting down, writing free flowing
Thoughts, unconcerned punctuation,
Just ideas suppressed in our erasure:
haunts we connected on—
our walk—
trans hookers wearing cheap stilettos to make buck
because of discrimination at work—
lonely nights wondering is this (motioning to lived life)
really worth it all?—
Another thought:
Where will I be in ten years from now?—
And yet another: Why do I fight?—

And so on, multiplication
With new connections formed,
Wondrous brain,
unexplained, mysterious neural pathways
that generate ideas freely,
coloured only by our own experiences
and imaginings

Quick steps down Decatur
drawn out now,
no hurry, no rush.
We write until the sun sets as
Little lamps light up and
Larger buildings glow magnificently,
A city unconcerned,
The Joneses unaware,
Repression of deconstruction
In a larger fabric,
Overly starched by discourses.

Thanks Foucault, I scribble on the page,
finally setting my pen down,
Tired mind only gazing at his calloused hands
Continuing the furious scribble I lost.
Three hundred ticks of the second hand
I gaze at the hands…
But they are not the same anymore,
Imagining red marks from past slaps,
Something more than flesh.

And from that realization
An idea ignites my tired mind.
I too am guilty of the blend.
Why did I not see it before?

With that question
He finally sets his pen down,
So? He asks simply.
So what? I reply, unsure of
What to let escape my mouth.
What do you want to do next?
The words come out so casually
I am taken aback.
Well…we…can…
Silence lingers for a long time
On the third ellipsis
Before a clear answer emerges.
How does not fucking sound?
Idea of perfect flesh lost in some other world.
Sounds good comes out—without hesitation
he goes on: I think I know what you mean.

As he grabs my hand, I feel the roughness as
We are interwoven, walking into the
Jungle night with only one expectation.