… On hearing the news that an angry man cut off his lover’s penis in a fit of jealousy

[Written/posted on Facebook, 8 July 2008]



Desire is a hotel room

Plush in sin

And keeling over the sink

A lover mourns



He has taken a knife

And pared down his lover

Cored him the way you would

An apple.

In the mirror,

he is bloody

but unbowed.



His young lover

Drowning in sleep,

Will wake soon.



His bones crumble

in grief.



In the dark,

Desire is a jealous cat

Ready

to pounce.

Borne down by love

In its most insidious

appearances

Kindness

is an excess

And

it is

futile.

Untitled short story, circa 2007

[Published last Feb 2009 on http://www.promdifiction.com]

I. The Jack of Spades

I have a confession to make.

I visited the station the other day, oblivious to the rest of the world, pushing past the crowds during rush hour, thinking of so many other things, the image of you interspersed with random conversations around me, trying to discern a pattern, a workable theory I could mull over, while I steadied myself, braced against the steel post not meant for more than two people.

A workable theory involves assumptions, basically untestable, and utterly dependent on the future. I ask myself often why I know the things I know now were it not for human instinct to refine the past, sanitize it, make it palatable, make it something totally alien to the needs of the present, an experience as still and as dead as the pictures gathering dust in my drawer.

In a long-abandoned box are a sheaf of papers containing letters excerpts of what would be the story of my life, hiding behind the persona of an ardent lover, trying to separate the writer from the subject, the truth from an attempt at disguising reality, the way one would dismiss a talking cat and admit the existence of domestic violence. Pure nonsense. Pure BS.

And that’s how my day meandered on along its timeless, meaningless pace. I got off at my destination and walked on, unmindful of the appointments I had to keep. I decided not to keep any appointments today, and I would take the journey I’d always dreamed about. I quoted T.S. Eliot in my head, wondering how I became that patient etherized on the table, taking each moment as it comes, being neither too happy or sad, just plain existing.

II. The Queen of Clubs

I have neither riches nor power, and so I bear the loneliest of pursuits – the fate of the clovers, dependent on luck, imprisoned by the occasional whims of fate. Because fate is unkind, we learn to be resilient. We know how to endure.

I ply my trade as one who can divine the past, guess at the future, and perhaps, control the present. It is certainly a lonely gift, one that alienates friends and one that forebodes an unhappy future for the one who sees.

Because I am not quite old and have a full figure, because I am a wanderer who came to settle in this place, because people don’t want their fortunes told on a daily basis, I’ve had to barter my body for food on the table as well. My seeing eye has little to do with the men who occasionally come to visit, on the pretext of a card reading. They do to me what they cannot do to their wives, to the promising women they court, to those who spurn their affections. They come crying on my shoulder after a bitter spat, drunken after losing money because of a badly played game, angry because their wives are unfaithful… I mop up their bloody cuts and bruises, cook for them, and I spread cards for them after they ask me to spread my legs. They amuse themselves by pretending they are still interested in their future.

This is how my days pass. I occasionally peddle my body but not my eyes. I endure the whispers behind my back, the snubs by the women who sell me fish and whose husbands fork over some money so I can continue peddling my wares. No one looks me in the eye, and no one wants to speak to me.

Ah, but I endure. I am a queen.

III. The Jack of Clubs

I made my decision purely on sleight of hand, purely on games of chance.

I took the bus back to my hometown, carrying a couple of ATMs and credit cards that would be useless here. I presented myself to a distant relative and asked to stay for a few days, and may I not be disturbed, I requested.

I was home coincidentally in time for the town fiesta, which is more of a bizarre Mardi Gras really, than any community affair celebrating the town’s patron saint. I’m not one to visit fortune tellers, but passing by this quiet booth in this provincial town, I had an irresistible urge to guess at the future. It was the one thing I never associated with the city – the mystery and the fear of the unknown, already foretold and waiting to happen.

She told me to pick out three cards. With businesslike precision, she spread the deck in front of me, fifty-two identical versions of an ornate blue.

I drew out a card and turned it over. It was the Queen of Spades.

“You tempt sorrow,” she smiled ironically, baring an uneven set of teeth.

I drew out another and she took it from me, studied it for a few seconds and shook her head. It was the Jack of Spades.

“She loves another,” she said to me.

Crestfallen as I was, I said nothing to contradict her.

With a trembling hand, I drew out the last card.

“Ah, but love still smiles upon you. Not with her, but in another place,” she smiled.

It was the Queen of Hearts.

IV. The Queen of Clubs

I have a confession to make.

The night we met at the fiesta, I told my first lie.

I spotted you from afar, obviously a city bred man-child deliriously lost in the humdrum of this provincial town. When your wandering gaze met mine, I stared back, almost willing you to come over. When you approached, I almost convinced myself that I told my own fortune well. It was endearing, really, watching you gather up the courage.

Of course, it had something to do with the cards.

I could sense your urgency. The longing to make sense of your private madness. You could not abide by the intervention of angels, and now you come to tempt your earthly fate. When you drew out the first card, I wanted to say something comforting, but I could not. When you drew out the second card, your despairing gaze was so palpable I did what I did.

I cheated you, and tempted my own fate. By drawing out the Queen of Hearts, I intervened in your destiny by making it my own. I said nothing to contradict your thoughts, as plain to me as the cards I read. That also meant losing my own God-given gift.

The days became more bearable. Fate became your addiction, and you started visiting me at home, looking to me to make sense of your chaos. I tried to win you over with my music, with my rough charms and my cooking.

You did not care for my other means of income, you wanted to know about my past. Here comes my second lie. I was not completely truthful to you. I have had three lovers – outside of the men of this village.

One spoke to me of his childhood. He told me I was hardened and cynical from birth. I did not want to offend him and merely agreed. He was in many ways a spoiled, senseless child. I envied his days of melting into the sea. We discovered each other’s bodies as though playing nursery games, but he was tainted beyond recognition.

One wanted me because I seemed learned in my craft. We rarely spoke, and only met in urgency. I have mastered the art, you see, of delineating intimacy in all its guises. If I ever thought of him, it was only because I wanted to possess him again and again.

One tried to seduce me with ideas. He mastered the art by mere intellect. For each craving I secretly nurtured, he would feed me with pellets of conversation. When the time came, he disappointed me. He could not marry his ideas with his passion.

They all used me, of course. But I used them, too. In a sense, it was always a mutual arrangement.


V. The Jack of Clubs Speaks to His Faithless Queen

In this place, I like to think that I don’t need you. One day flows into the next, and I hardly give you a second thought.

I come here because it consoles me. Breathing the city means breathing you. The day-to-day bewilderment, the randomness of the billboards along the highways that rise to meet the stars, the daily struggle for a seat in the train, a window of five minutes to avoid a deduction for tardiness, the glamorous Dionysian parties on weekend that I read about in magazines – I cannot abide by such cosmopolitan madness.

I wish you were here with me. It takes five hours to get here by bus, and what a luxurious sleep with you resting against my shoulder. I would win you over with my stories, with my knowledge of this faraway place, and tell you everything I’ve read in the travel books. You would listen to me, you would find my talk a little interesting, and maybe, finally, we could talk about our childhoods. We would imagine we spent the first afternoons of our lives together climbing trees and chasing after spiders and butterflies. The present would be an extension of our idyllic past.

And when we’re both tired and flushed from the excitement of our shared memories, we would slowly nod off – but you would fall asleep before I do. I would time my breathing with the rise and fall of your chest.

You would not need to love another.

VI. Queen of Hearts in Disguise

I have a confession to make.

I want to tell you why I cannot look you in the eye. I studiously fasten my gaze on inanimate objects in front of me, trying not to arouse your suspicion when I glance at your profile. Memory is elusive, you see, and while I want to remember the shirt that you’re wearing or how your eyes light up when you tell me about something that means to you, I cannot form a clear enough image in my mind.

I wish I could trace the contours of your face with my fingers. I would start from your forehead to the tip of your nose, down to your lips. Then I would tilt your chin upwards and make you face me. Do you understand? Your face will leave imprints on my hands so that I can recall your face one day when my memory fails me. When I think of you, I only see shadows and shapes, mediated by how I want to remember you. Sometimes I imagine that your gaze is fixed upon me, and that you have better eyes. You will remember me that way, just by looking at me. But I can only remember you in Braille.

I wish I could explain to you that when my smile is too bright while my gaze drifts away, I am upset with you. I have no reason, really, to demand your undivided attention. But imagine this, imagine you are a child again and it is your first time to deliver a speech before a crowd that might as well number a hundred strong, and your chest is puffed up, your hands are shaking and when you open your mouth to speak, your voice squeaks. The audience looks at you politely, they try to listen to you at first, but after the first few sentences they have already judged you and lost interest. That is how I feel when I talk to you. You have the ability to respond to my tentative words and questions without needing to think, you needn’t listen to my futile attempts at meaningful conversation. My voice disappears into the general din, and you have lost interest.

Your only interest is in the cards. In your Queen of Sorrows.

VII. The Jack of Clubs Speaks to His Queen

I am leaving this place now.

I am coming back to the city to find you.

VIII. A Queen No Longer

I have lost my gift. The future is now madness.

I have lost you. You did not even deem it fit to secure a proper parting.

I wrote you my confession, but I thought I need not give it, since the cards told me you would decide to stay.

The cards have learned to deceive me now, the way I deceived them.

To the men who found my gift alluring, I’ve become as dull and shapeless as their lives. They have nothing to do with me now. Since the day I learned to cheat you, I have become the master of deception. I wander this town aimlessly now, shuffling my now useless pack of cards, challenging children with a few coins to a gambling game. I play cards with them, and then I take their money.

I am writing you this letter by an abandoned dirt path that leads to a forgotten stream. It is quiet here, where I am, the early morning sounds and the quiet of late evening mark my days. I wake up as usual, take long walks to the town market, and walk quietly among people whose language I cannot speak. But I ply my trade here, I have nowhere to go. They refuse to speak to me. Signs and guttural sounds and pantomimes sustain me – a few vigorous gesticulations and I can pick out the fish I want to take home.

If I let my mind drift long enough, I can pretend I don’t need you.

At night, I lie awake in the improvised hammock I made, watching the stars. The comforting sound of rustling leaves and crickets and the swishing sounds of the breeze allow me some measure of peace.

To Deadline

Deadline crawls into bed with me just as I'm about to close my eyes.

Deadline jumps on my bed just when I hit the snooze button at 8 in the morning.

Deadline sits at the back of my class, waiting to be called.

Deadline whispers in my ear just as I'm about to write a poem.

Deadline eavesdrops and butts in phone conversations.

Deadline turns the pages of a novel I've been dying to read for weeks.

Deadline fiddles with the maximum volume of my iPod just when I'm humming a happy tune.

Deadline says "tsk, tsk" when I'm feeding my fluff pet.

Deadline pops up in my Friendster and Multiply views.

Deadline follows me to the bathroom when I need to pee.

Deadline logs into my Yahoo messenger smack in the middle of a conversation with my babe. (I ignore Deadline)

Deadline tries to interrupt my much needed hug therapy. (I ignore Deadline)

Deadline lights up my cigarettes for me.

Deadline wriggles into my shirt just as I'm on my way to work.

draft, untitled

i.

the church
is a spiral
of ivy
sinking into
a sepulchural
sleep

an angel weeps
but her tears
frozen by the ages
have long
turned to stone

her eyes are open,
fixed at some far off
point, but i turn to her
still, in a gesture
of sympathy

ii.

it seems i have lived
in more hotel rooms than i can remember
plush as sin, in the arms
of a stranger or fleeing from
unseen pursuit. doors open,
and close, folding into each other,
more and more doors
more rooms to feed upon
a labyrinth: inescapable,
sinking into mahogany
and decadent carpeting
i am hiding behind a desk,
escaping to the bathroomwith You,
You, i cannot name: i must know you
we must have met somewhere,
perhaps in a coffeeshop
conversing about existentialism and art
over our steaming styrofoam cups
why else would i follow you?

Manila is a Love Affair with Chaos

Loneliness, alienation are said to be by products of urbanization. The cold and uninviting city, offering anonymity, transience and isolation among proximity is as individual as it is societal.

Born and bred in Manila, I grew up in fear and fascination of its complexity. Initially sheltered from its less savory aspects, it was only over the years that I came to see a living painting I ceaselessly attempt to capture in words. It is an exciting love affair, it evolves but persists because it makes no demands or promises and expects nothing. It is also unrequited.

Absent the familial ties of a close-knit community, it is chaos constantly struggling to order itself. Manila is irrational, making up its rules and refusing to obey them. In Quiapo they sell black candles and mysterious bottled objects right outside the church. Jeepney drivers with eyes at the back of their head squeeze into crowded lanes, peddlers navigate the labyrinthine traffic and ply all sorts of things – from candy and cigarettes to battery-powered cellphone chargers, not really caring if the stoplight changes from red to green. Some government offices refuse to do business as early as half an hour before closing, and a regular office is abuzz with gossip and a lack of urgency. And malls that hold Sunday Mass – perhaps only in the Philippines. Pedestrians set the laws of the street in large numbers. Just look at Taft Avenue on a busy day (it’s perpetually busy) and you’ll know what I mean.

This is but one aspect of life in the city of cities, Manila. Manila is dirty and crowded, fueled by inefficiency and traffic, typically “Third World”, where transactions are often in the black market and the informal economy cannot die. A greater number are unemployed, live on the streets, scavenge for food, steal or kill to survive.

What is it about the city that inspires fear? Is it the sensationalized bits and pieces they show on television?

This is the city I know, or so I’ve been told. A city that looks on poverty and unrest everyday, but grows in numbers. A city that already used up promises of a rosy future long ago, and still attracts dreamers. Here, we struggle for space, we struggle to breathe, we struggle against struggling. We will ourselves to exist. We live.

The city that holds me in thrall is a beautiful city. Beautiful amid the grit and the squalor, the uncertainty and the dangers. Beautiful because of its anarchy, the perpetual chaos that never quite resolves itself. Beautiful because its eyes are always wide open, holding a disinterested watch. Manila is always, always on the brink of insomnia.

(for transit news magazine)

Untitled

[Written June 2008, appeared in when hephaestus fell and other poems]

This is not a love letter:
Nothing here bears
the calluses of youth,
Starry-eyed, tentative
None of the imaginative stirrings
Of first love, first blood
No longer uncharted, devoid
of childish pride
and bravura, the romance
of the unfamiliar

I will write about the fine lines
Treading delicately on your skin,
The yeras creeping up to gently
wear away at your bones,
And I marvel
At the quiet, companionate silence
Of travelers, and the familiarity
The chasm
Of childhoods that we bridge
With a word and a memory

You would be the shelter
I cling to,
I would be the cradle
For you to repose, lonely
as a child and no longer
Brave, or fearless: we trace
Each other's scars
And lick our wounds dry
Like tigers

Mother to A Child

[Written 17 June 2008]

Leaving a lover

To marry a name
And merge with the plurality
Of others
Watching,
Disembodied

Fron the explosion
of your womb
To resent the carefree
Lines of your youth

Like a ghost
To kill and die and live
for:
the smallness of hands,
the untouched,
the helpless,
the unformed.

Oh, the fragility
and the silence.

The Restlessness of Morning

[Written August 2007]

there is a brightly colored ball
nested, wires interlaced -
a screen,
there is a room i slept in:
a mattress, a warm breath
on my cheek
and in the morning,
engines singing
like crickets

there is a familiar
but uneven path
when it rains,
the mud is unsettled
by water,
and there are three stones
that appear,
to hop on
with one foot
like a childish game
of hopscotch

there is an unraveling
of minutes,
unspooled as they are,
and each second is
spelled out,
like a word

Elemental Furies

[Written 16 August 2007]

We have no space for Noah’s Ark
No easy classification of species
Willing themselves to salvation

All this I thought about
When I saw the well-dressed men
And women abandon themselves
To the wrath of God

Climbing out of cars
No better than toy boats,
Sinking uselessly
Mired in mud waters –
Just rewards of our capitalist age

Rich or poor, you will all die
Of boredom or despair
Crawling your way out
Of the Fallen metropolis
While a helicopter looms overhead
And takes aerial shots
For the evening news

Street Cannibalism

[Written sometime in 2007]

craving the city

is an incurable disease,
can accommodate
a transient need for food
(just as there are places
in the city
that accommodate
desperate groping and
fleetingsex)
the balut* eggs wrapped
in last year’s
yellow pages,
and rock salt thrashing
about in a paper boat,
eveloped in
inky smudged corners

ii.

squatting next to the
mildly interested cat
he cracks the egg
on the asphalt
gently, quick to suck out
the amniotic fluid

(the joke: the aborted chick’s urine,
last minute excretions of fear
before it dies, and hence
the salty-fishy flavor,
just as they laugh at our corpulent
deposed President
and our poverty)

… slurping loudly until
the chick is bone dry and silent,
the spidery yellowy yolk
for his taking,
swallowed up in salt, eyes
closed as he savors
its gritty-rubbery texture,
briefly:
the vulgarity of the sea
on his tongue

iii.

and he smiles,
(at the day’s wages saved:
a little extra for that field trip
his youngest needs,
to take the tricycle
instead of the lonely walk home)
pleased it was a fresh egg,
and any momentary
discomfort
of half-formed legs,
feathers, beak
would be swallowed up
in the grittiness of salt.

Casual

[Written sometime in 2005]

the way i hold a cigarette
between my fingers,
thoughtlessness
taking slow, deliberate
drags, exhaling
the smoke
flicking at the ash
with the tip of an index
finger, not
looking at you
not looking at you
in particular

the way we have
these conversations
without actually saying
anything,
languidly
watching from the
foot of the bed,
i turn and
feel the urgency slide off
and rise
ever so slowly

the way i seem to sit
comfortable
among tidy conversations
or raging debates
neither here nor there
expectant
but noncommital

no grace
or skill
just going
against realtime
mode
no predisposition
to anyone or anything
just a brief once over
then..

Third World Snow

third world snow

the tyranny of the sun
lasted for days,
bleeding the earth
dry
the trees rose up in revolt
arms flailing upward
in desperate prayer
to summon rain and
unleashing a madness
of cotton,
swarming like bees
the frail tufts of white
raining down

angry streaks of cotton,
leaves and dust
spur a frenzy to seek refuge
in concrete enclosures
shielding the eyes, nose and mouth
from the veritable blizzard
eclipsing the familiarity of rain

amid the gaggle of voices
a motorist plunges headlong
into the madness, gleefully shouts

snow! we have snow
in the philippines!

can we have our snow angels now?
our snow men with the crooked nose
and eyes for buttons?
would santa and his reindeer park their
sleigh this christmas?
and can we put nutmeg in apple cider,
sing chestnuts roasting on an open fire?

wanting the white picket fences and the small town quirks
wanting the small town quirks and a roast turkey on thanksgiving
wanting thanksgiving and the mayflower and the pilgrims
wanting the pilgrims and the natives feast like the pictures in the glossy books
wanting the glossy books where the dog’s name is spot and not bantay
wanting the pure-blood pride not the mongrel shame
wanting the blue-collar pride and the american dream
wanting the american dream with that genuwine twang and american slang
wanting the american slang not the call center twang

we can huddle together
for some warmth
pretend we're eskimos
building an igloo
and dream of spring..

the cotton puffs
defiant and white
descend quietly
to the earth,
fallen snow
angels
cradled by
the unseeing
streets

On Remembering

[Written April 2007]

you will remember it differently
than i, you and your discrete units of time,
marked by the traffic of people
that arrive, and stay, and sometimes
stop to talk, or perhaps you remember
geographically, what is fixed
and what moves, where it moves,
what is comfortably still,
or perhaps you remember
in color, the absence of shadow,
the tables and chairs laid out
and remain constant like set pieces
in some theatrical play, day
after day without aging,
and all else is peripheral to you,
or perhaps you remember none of it at all,
while i brush away the images
of chairs and tables and people like annoying cobwebs,
leaving only a few knickknacks of memory,
and you've never noticed how
i try to sound more interesting, and
when i talk to you, i am part
nervousness, and all illusion
of confidence, and if i asked you,
"what color and shade
are my eyes," you would stammer
slightly and make a foolish
guess, but i, i can tell you
that sometimes when your eyes widen
just so, they are a luminosity in the darkness,
and then perhaps you would ask "how can light
penetrate black on black?" but i will tell you
that black has nuances too,
not just the paradox of absence, and
that sometimes when you're terribly excited,
the color is startlingly clear
and transparent like a mirror: these fragments
are important to me. i remember well.

A Former Lover Remembers

[Written April 2007]

he remembers her body well
even though it was mostly obscured
by darkness,
fully clothed in daylight
he would still recognize her
anywhere

the casual hellos they exchange now
do not betray them
the occasional pleasantries
do not hint at secrets
neither do they suggest
at some future opportune time

he realizes that he never saw her
twist in her sleep
most nights were just nights,
sinking in, marked by the riot
of clothing on the floor

after the awkwardness
of consummation
- or perhaps,
the assumption of it,

they dress
and part

The Poet

[Written April 2007]

He scratches out lines
On whatever his hands chance upon:
His weather-beaten, hopelessly outdated laptop,
A page in an abandoned notebook,
A receipt from yesterday’s coffee break,
Or the back of his hand, even
Words scamper away from him otherwise
Skittish and imprecise,
It is a game and of utmost necessity
To hold them down,
And force them to take shape

Minute things trigger the impulse:
Perhaps it is a conversation between strangers
In the jeepney he rode today
Where, fascinated by the idle talk, he randomly tuned in
Like twiddling the radio to capture a stray frequency,
Or running into a scavenger child, whooping and running
As he passes, a straw bag for his treasures
Hitched on a bony shoulder, tapping on the sidewalk with his scavenging stick,
Stooping slightly to snatch up an empty plastic bottle before anyone else does:
It is worth P50 per kilo at the nearest junkyard

The city speaks to him when it does,
When the fading strains of the videoke session next door
Signal that it must be early morning,
And people do have to retire to bed,
If only to have enough strength for the next day’s
Drinking marathon
He listens for the retreating footsteps,
The cheerful farewells and the too-loud ribbing,
The dying whirr of engines as they pass
And settle on some uneven and unpaved sidewalk

At night, sans the sound of crickets
And cooing birds
He lies awake: prophet and lover,
Arrested by the dirt and the grit and the beauty
Of this overcrowded, overpopulated city
Uncompromising and unapologetic as it is
He longs for the lull of forest and sea
But knows they have no place here
Knows they could not cleanse this forsaken place,
Where people have learned to bury their lives
With dignity, with humor and with peace,
The way they mourn their dead.

The Ritual of Washing Hair

[Written 8 April 2007]

she is often told
by mama, by inang
that it is her greatest asset
like the river it should
flow down to her shoulders
uninterrupted,
light should create
rippes, and
the glints should dance
like fireflies

use it to enchant a man,
they coax her,
but do not return his gaze.
he will go mad
at the possibility
of the touch and scent of it -
he will not forget you...
use it with utmost humility
so your envious friends
will not wish ill upon you
and celebrate with you
when you marry a rich man
and leave this place

she remembers it all,
chants it to herself
like a carefully constructed prayer
when water intertwines
with her fingers
in her hair
covering her body reverentially
like scented oil, the droplets
only lingering just so,
before they are overpowered
by the chilliness of her skin

she marvels at its weight:
her entire being concentrated
in a seamless weaving
of follicles and skin


it is the only nakedness
that she permits.

ON POETRY

[Written March 14, 2007]

if words do not turn
into lies
or ideals, if pain
can be bought and sold
with a few truthful
lines, then -

there is no sound
to destroy
the waking: only
the formless,
yearning
to be named
can summon your pain
and make it yours
and bear your name,
your multitude
of scars

What is the shortest distance between two points?

[Written 16 March 2007]

You might forget
That point A
Travels along the pinpricks
Of shadows
And while a straight line
Will close the gap
Between them,
Point A will evade you
Like a silent wolf
Solitary
And unmoved

Untitled

[Written 4 Mar 2007]

culled from the recesses
of an antiquated refrigerator
i appease my hunger
an obese woman inside
greedily feeling my way
through the mummified
assortments
ravenous, as i pick
and choose
among the dying
and already dead

sometimes an orange,
sometimes an onion
softened and rottened
by the chill
sometimes it’s leftover
chicken, shrunken
and dry sometimes
it’s an expired
milk carton
and the stench
briefly dulls
the senses

all cadavers
i might as well
be dead

A Poem Born Out of Rage

[Written March 3, 2007]

Because you do not
Understand
That women are not
Objects to be seized,
Bartered and exchanged
Like trading cards
We are not mementos
Of adolescent youth
Passed around
Like dog-eared Playboy magazines
Encrusted and gray with
Your early attempts
At becoming

A man who puffs up his chest
Beats it like a drum
Thinks he owns the world, and
Sexual tension permeates the room
(sexual: because we are divided along
biological and ideological lines),
Crackles like electricity
You anticipate the promise,
the possibility
Presumptuous as you are
(because you think we have roles
to fulfill, your teenage porn fantasy)

And you call us to approach –
Single file,
Whipping out a folder
Filled with our dossiers
(Here come the labels now):
Virgin-whore, sinner-saint,
Lesbian-straight, tight-loose,
Biblical temptation in its various guises,
Not even an acknowledgement of
our continuing struggles
at becoming