Pleasure Dome. Yusef Komunyakaa
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guardian angel lingers
at the top of the stairs,
counting each drop of sweat
paid in tribute. The blonde
has her eyes closed, & the brunette
is looking at me. Our bodies
sway to each riff, the jasmine
rising from a valley somewhere
in Egypt, a white moon
opening countless false mouths
of laughter. The midnight
gatherers are boys & girls
with the headlights of trucks
aimed at their backs, because
their small hands refuse to wound
the knowing scent hidden in each bloom.
The Whispering Gallery
She’s turning away, about to step
out of the concave cuddle of Italian tiles
before walking through the grand
doorway to cross 42nd Street
to glance up at The Glory of Commerce
as she hails a yellow taxicab
when he whispers, I love you, Harriet.
Did he say something to himself,
something he swore he’d never think
again? Or, was she now limestone
like Minerva, a half-revealed secret,
her breasts insinuating the same
domed wisdom? Maybe his mind
was already heading home to Hoboken—
his body facing hers—his unsure feet
rushing to make a connection
with Sinatra’s ghost
among a trainload of love cries
from the Rustic Cabin to Caesar’s Palace.
Hugged there under the curved grandeur,
she says, I love you, too, Johnny.
Tuesday Night at the Savoy Ballroom
Entangled in one motion
of hues stolen from innuendo,
their exulted limbs couple
& uncouple till the bluish
yellow fuses with three
other ways of looking at this.
With a touch of blood
& congealed tempera,
black & white faces surge
through a nightlife
sweating perfumed air.
Their moves caught
by brush strokes
force us to now feel
the band on an unseen
stage. Bedazzlement
& body chemistry …
eyes on each other break
the law. They work
hard for fun, twirling
through sighing loops
of fray & splendor,
watering down pain till naked
hope glimmers in a shot glass.
Doppelgängers
I wait outside the Beacon Hotel
for a taxicab to La Guardia,
& dead ringers for Memnon
slink past. Here’s another.
Wasn’t Aurora’s son
killed fighting in Troy
for the Trojans?
His look-alikes stroll
through glass towers
& waylay each other’s shadows.
How many southern roads
brought their grandparents
here? Why so many chalk-lined
bodies mapping departure
routes? The Daylight Boys
haunt these footsteps tuned
to rap & butterfly
knives that grow into
Saturday-night specials
tucked inside jackets
ensigned with Suns, Bulls …
Ice. Ecstasy. Crack.
Here’s another young,
bad, good-looking one
walking on air solid
as the Memnon Colossi,
& may not be here at dawn.
Somewhere
I was on the corner
when she paused
at the crosswalk.
If a cobra’s in a coil, it can’t
take back its strike. Her
purse was already in my hands
when the first punch landed.
She kept saying, “You won’t
take nobody else’s money no
more.” Her voice was like
Mama’s. I couldn’t
break free. Women & kids
multiplied before me.
At least thirty or forty.
Everywhere. Kicking & biting.
I kept saying, “I give
up.” But they wouldn’t
stop aiming at my balls.
The sky tumbled. I was a
star in a late-night movie
where all these swallows—no,
a throng of boys swooped
like a cloud of birds
& devoured a man
on a lonely beach
in Mexico, & somewhere
outside Acapulco that damn
squad of sunflowers
blazed up around me.
What I heard the stupid
paramedics say scared me
to death, as the bastards
worked on my fucking heart.
Never Land
I don’t wish you were one
of The Jackson Five
tonight, only you were
still inside yourself
unchanged by the vampire
moonlight.