Adulteress
(True Story based on a Photograph at the Circus)
It must be those black losses,
real cries that carry a long time
on their broken backs, should it
be right or wrong then or now,
should it be at all? He laughed
at the picture, a trapeze artist
and clown out of focus, the light
on the heads of the people pure,
complete and inside of their
wistful noggins watching the show
not a thing going on, not a thing.
His trunk was full of shampoo
and cleansers. He was a neurologist
and at that time, I loved neurologists.
Any neurologist could squeeze
and obtain the whole burlesque
without even a handshake.
Brain surgeons too but not
the pulmonologists who are all
evil, very evil people. Why?
Oh, I don’t know
guess it’s just a totem
to call my own, we all have those
special foods and rules.
I found out later and perhaps
too late that this meant not a thing.
It is a black loss and revives itself
& every so often, smacks me around.
It is a savage regeneration
of old enemies who presented
as pals, left sweet notes and ransoms,
parcels full of purse and perfumes
that later on gagged me, tortured
me into telling and torturing another,
and another and another, a grievous
charge and perilous penance that
might cost it all, cost every last cent
and still, I am no longer handsome or smart
but all the same, the lack of hell
in their sentiments shortchanges
the folks we know, the folks like me.
Or, at least, it seems to as we lean
this way and that way between
our very own rights and wrongs,
the strangest blessings in the world
arise like lights to show us the way/
Who do you suppose called it adultery?
Who first invented the theft and clergy?