with gravel lots and a winding cement road, Dorothy
tap-dances to Oz, up the yellow brick road, the great gray road,
he’s on you, twisted on top o f you, his arms twisted in your
arms, his legs twisted in your legs, he’s twisted in you, there’s
a great animal in the dark, him twisting draped over you, the
sweat silver and slick; the houses are brick, monuments
around you, you’re laid out dead and they’re the headstones,
nothing written on them, they tower over your body put to
rest. The only signs o f existence are on you, you carry them on
you, the marks, the bruises, the scars, your body gets marked
where you exist, it’s a history book with the signs o f civilized
life, communication, the city, the society, belles lettres, a
primitive alphabet o f blood and pain, the flesh poem, poem o f
the girl, when a girl says yes, what a girl says yes to, what
happens to a girl who is poesy on cement, your body the paper
and the poem, the press and the ink, the singer and the song;
it’s real, it’s literal, this song o f myself, yo u ’re what there is,
the medium, the message, the sign, the signifier; an autistic
poem. Tattooed boys are your friends, they write the words
on their skin; but your skin gets used up, scraped aw ay every
time they push you down, you carry what you got and what
you know, all your belongings, him on you through time, in
the scars— your meanings, your lists, your items, your serial
numbers and identification numbers, social security, registration, which one you are, your name in blood spread thin on
your skin, spread out on porous skin, thin and stretched, a
delicate shade o f fear toughened by callouses o f hate; and you
learn to read your name on your body written in your blood,
the book o f signs, manhood or courage but it’s different when
pussy does it. Y ou don’t set up housekeeping, a room with
things; instead you carry it all on you, not on your back tied
down, or on your head piled up; it’s in you, carved in, the cold
on you, you on cement, sexy abrasions, sexy blood, sexy
black and blue, the heat’s on you, your sw eat’s a wet
membrane between you and the weather, all there is, and you
have burns, scars, there’s gray cement, a silver gray under a
tarnished, brassy moon, there’s a cement graveyard, brick
gravestones, the em pty brick buildings; and yo u ’re laid out,
for the fucking. Walt was a fool, a virgin fool; you would have
been ground down, it’s not love, it’s slaughter, you fucking
fool. I’m the field, they fall on me and bruise the ground, you
don’t hear the earth you fall on crying out but a poet should
know. Prophets are fucking fools. What I figured out is that
writers sit in rooms and make it up. M arx made it up. Walt
made it up. Fucking fools like me believe it; do it; foot soldiers
in hell. Sleep is the worst time, God puts you in a fuck-m e
position, you can’t run, you can’t fight, you can’t stay alive
without luck, you’re in the dark and dead, they can get you,
have you, use you; you manage to disappear, become invisible
in the dark, or it’s like being hung out to dry, you’re under
glass, in a museum, all laid out, on display, waiting fpr
whatever gang passes by to piss on you; it’s inside, they’re not
supposed to come inside but there is no inside where they can’t
come, it’s only doors and windows to keep them out, open
sesame and the doors and windows open or they bash them
open and no one stops them and you’re inside laid out for
them, come, hurt me now, I’m lying flat, helpless, some
fucking innocent naked baby, a sweet, helpless thing all curled
up like a fetus as if I were safe, inside her; but there’s nothing
between you and them; she’s not between you and them. Why
did God make you have to sleep? I was born in Camden; I’m
twenty; I can’t remember the last time I heard my name. M y
name is and will the real one please stand up, do you remember
that game show on television, from when it was easy. Women
will whisper it to you, even dirty street women; even leather
women; even mean women. Y ou have to be careful i f you
want it from the street women; they might be harder than you,
know where you’re soft, see through you, you’re all different
with them because maybe they can see through you. M aybe
you’re not the hardest bitch. Maybe she’s going to take from
you. I don’t give; I take. It’s when she’s on me I hear m y name;
doesn’t matter who she is, I love her to death, women are
generous this way, the meanest o f us, I say her name, she says
mine, kisses brushing inside the ear, she’s wet all over me, it’s
all continuous, you’re not in little pieces, I hear m y name like
the sound o f the ocean in a shell; whether she’s saying it or not.
We’re twisted around each other inside slime and sweat and
tear drops, w e’re the wave and the surf, the undercurrent, the
pounding o f the tidal wave halfway around the world banging
the beach on a bright, sunny day, the tide, high tide, low tide,
under the moon or under a black sky, w e’re the sand wet and
hard deserted by the water, the sand under the water, gravel
and shell and m oving claws crawling. I remember this one
woman because I wanted her so bad but something was
wrong, she was lying to me, telling me m y lie but no woman
lies to me. There’s this woman at night I remember, in a
restaurant I go when I’m taking a break, kosher restaurant
with old men waiters, all night it’s open, big room, plain
tables, high ceilings, ballroom high and wide, big, em pty
feeling, old, old building, in N ew Y o rk , wide dow ntow n
street, gray street, fluorescent lights, a greenish light on green
walls, oil paint, green, the old men have thick Jew ish accents,
they’re slow m oving, you can feel their bones aching, I sit
alone over coffee and soup and she’s there at the next table, the
room ’s em pty but she sits at the table next to me, black leather
pants, she’s got black hair, painted black, like I always wanted,
and I want her but I’m her prey because she wants a bow l o f
fucking soup, she’s picked me, she’s coming for me, how did
that happen, how did it get all fucked up, she sees me as the
mark because I’ve got the food which means I’ve got the
money and I can’t go with her now because she has an
underlying bad motive, she wants to eat, and what I feel for
her is complete sex, so I’m the dope; and I don’t do the dopey
part; it’s m y game and she’s playing it on me; she’s got muscles
and I want to see the insides o f her thighs, I want to feel them, I
want her undressed, I want her legs around m y shoulders, she
smiles, asks me how I am; be a fool, tell her how you are. I
look right through her. I stare right through her while I’m
deciding what to do. I ain’t giving; I take. I want to be with
her, I want to be between her legs and all over her and her
thighs a
vise around m y neck; I want m y teeth in her; I want
her muscles squeezing me to death and I want to push dow n on
her shoulders and I want m y thighs crushing down on her, all
m y weight on her hips, m y skin, bluish, on the inside o f m y
thighs feeling her bones; but I'm the mark, that’s how she sees
it, and maybe she’s meaner than me, or crazy, or harder, or
feels less, or needs less, so she’s on top and she takes; how
many times have I done what she’s doing now and did they
want me the w ay I want her; well, they’re stupid and I’m not;
it hurts not to take her with me, I could put m y hand on her
and she’d come, I stare right through her, I look right through
her but I’m devouring her at the same time which means she
knows I’m a fool; she’s acting harmless but maybe it’s a lie, my
instincts say it’s a lie, there’s no harmless women left alive this
time o f night, not on these streets. Y ou risk too much if you go
with a woman who needs less than you do; if you don’t have
to, if you have a choice, you don’t take risks— you could lose
your heart or your money or your speed; fucking fool who has
a choice and doesn’t use it; it’s stupid middle-class girls you
have to find or street women past wanting, past ambition,
they live on bits o f this and pieces o f that, they’re not looking
for any heavy score, they live almost on air, it’s pat, habit, they
don’t need you, but sometimes they like a taste; survival’s an
art, there are nuances, she’s a dangerous piece o f shit, stunning
black eyes, and I’m smitten, and I walk out, look behind me,
she came out, watched me, didn’t follow, made me nervous, I
don’t often pass up what I want, I don’t like doing it, it leaves
an ache, don’t like to ache too long without distracting m yself
by activity, anything to pass the time, and it makes me restless
and careless, to want someone like that; I wanted her, she
wanted food, money, most o f what happens happens for food,
all kinds o f food, deep hungers that rock you in their
everloving arms, rocked to eternal sleep by what you need, the
song o f myself, I need; need her; remember her; need women;
need to hear m y name; wanted her; she wanted food. What’s
inside you gets narrow and mean— it’s an edge, it cuts, it’s a
slice o f sharp, a line at the blade’s end, no surface, no waste, no
tease, a thin line where your meanest edge meets the air; an
edge, no blade you can see. If you could stomp on me, this is
what yo u ’d see— a line, touch it, yo u ’re slivers. I’d be cut
glass, yo u ’d be feet. Y o u ’d dance blood. The edge o f the blade,
no surface, just what cuts, a thin line, touch it, draw blood.
Inside, nothing else is alive. Where’s the love I dream of. I hole
up, like a bug in a rug. There’s women who bore me; wasted
time; the taste o f death; junkie time; a junkie woman comes to
me, long, languid afternoons making love but I didn’t like it,
she got beat up by her boyfriend, she’s sincerely in love, black
and blue, loving you, and he’s her source; pure love; true
romance. D on ’t like m ixing women with obligation— in this
case, the obligation to redeem her from pain. I want to want; I
like wanting, ju st so it gets fulfilled and I don’t have to wait too
long; I like the ache just long enough to make what touches it
appreciated a little more, a little drama, a little pain. I don’t like
no beat-up piece o f shit; junkie stooge. Y ou don’t want the
edge o f the blade to get dull; then you got dullness inside and
this you can’t afford. The w om an’s got to be free; a beast o f
freedom; not a predator needing a bow l o f fucking soup, not a
fool needing a fucking fix; she’s got to give freedom off, exude
it, she’s got to be grand with freedom, all swelled up with it, a
Madame Curie o f freedom, or she’s Garbo, or more likely,
she’s Che, she’s got to be a monster o f freedom, a hero o f
loveless love; Napoleon but they didn’t lock her up or she got
loose, now, for me; no beat up junkie fool; no beautiful piece
looking for a hamburger. There’s magnificent women out
here. These lights light you up. Y ou are on Broadw ay and
there are stars o f a high magnitude. There’s the queen o f them
all who taught me— sweet name, Rebecca; ruthless crusher o f
a dyke; honest to God, she’s wearing a gold lame dress when I
meet her in jail when I’m a kid, eighteen, a political prisoner as
it were, as I saw myself, and she loves poetry and she sends me
a pile o f New Yorker magazines because, she says, I’m a poet;
and I don’t want her on me, not in jail, I’m too scared, too
hurt, but she protects me anyway, and I get out fast enough
that I don’t have to do her, and I see her later out here and I
remember her kindness, which it was, real kindness, taking
care o f me in that place, which was w hy I was treated right by
the other inmates as it were; I see her on the street, gold lame
against a window, I see her shimmering, and I go with her for
thanks and because she is grand, and I find out you can be free
in a gold lame dress, in jail, whoring, in black skin, in hunger,
in pain, in strife, the strife o f the streets, perpetual war, gritty,
gray, she’s the wild one with freedom in her soul, it translates
into how you touch, what’s in your fingers, the silk in your
hands, the freedom you take with who you got under you;
you got your freedom and you take theirs for when you are
with them, you are a caretaker o f the fragile freedom in them,
because most women don’t got much, and you don’t be afraid
to take, you turn their skin to flames, you eat them raw, your
name’s all over them, you wrap them up in you, crush them in
you, and what you give is ambition, the ambition to do it
big, do it great, big gestures, free— girls do it big, girls soar,
girls burn, girls take big not puny; stop giving, child, better
to be stole from than to give— stop giving away the little that
you got. I stay with her until she’s finished with me, she’s
doing her art on me, she’s practicing freedom on me; I’m
shaking from it, her great daring, the audacity o f her body on
mine; she’s free on me and I learn from it on me how to do it
and how to be it; flamboyant lovemaking, no apology, dead
serious, we could die right after this and this is the last thing
we know and it’s enough, the last minute, the last time, the
last touch, God comes down through her on me, the good
God, the divine God; master lovemaker, lightning in a girl,
I’ve got a new theology, She’s a rough Girl; and what’s
between m y legs is a running river, She made it then She
rested; a running river; so deep, so long, clear, bright, smart,
racing, white foam over a cliff and then a dead drop and then it
keeps on going, running, racing, then the smooth, silk calm, the
deep calm, the long, silk body, smooth. I heard some man say I
put it in her smooth, smo
oth was a noun, and I knew right
away he liked children, he’s after children, there are such men;
but it’s not what I mean; I mean that together w e’re smooth, it’s
smooth, w e’re smooth on each other, it’s a smooth ride; and if I
died right after I wouldn’t feel cheated or sorry and every time
I’m happy I had her one more second and I feel proud she wants
me; and she’ll disappear, she’ll take someone else, but I’ll sit here
like a dumb little shit until she does, a student, sitting, waiting at
her feet, let her touch me once, then once more, I’m happy near
her, her freedom ’s holding me tight, her freedom ’s on me,
around me, climbing inside me, her freedom ’s embracing me;
wild woman; a wild w om an’s pussy that will not die for some
junkie prick; nor songwriter; nor businessman; nor
philosopher. The men are outside, they want to come in, I
hear them rattling around, death threats, destruction isn’t
quiet or subtle, imagine those for whom it is, safe, blessedly
safe; so in m y last minutes on this earth, perhaps, I am
remembering Rebecca who taught me freedom; I would sit
down quiet next to her, wait for her, watch her; did you ever
love a girl? I’ve loved several; loved. N ot just wanted but
loved in thought or action. Wasn’t raped by any o f them. I
mean, rape’s just a word, it doesn’t mean anything, someone
fucks you, so what? I can’t see complaining about it. But I
wasn’t hurt by any o f them. I don’t mean I w asn’t hurt by love;
shit, that’s what love does, it drags your heart over a bed o f
nails, I was hurt by love, lazy, desperate drinks through long
nights o f pain without her, hurting bad. Wasn’t pushed
around. Saw others who were. It’s not that wom en don’t. It’s
just that it had m y name on it, men said pussy or dyke or
whatever stupid distortion but I saw freedom, I heard Andrea,
I found freedom under her, wrapped around her, her lips on
me and her hands on me, in me, her thighs holding on to me;
there’s always men around waiting to break in, throw
themselves on top, pull you down; but wom en’s different, it’s
Mercy Page 14
