ISSUE: Spring 2004
Provincetown, June 2002
On seeing you that second time last night,
Pat Benatar a disembodied blare
amidst a night yet ravenous for dares,
I thought I’d talk to you, to ask you why
you let him grab your bangled arm that way.
Presumptuous, I thought myself, to want
to enter in your narrative of hurt.
A sparkly rhinestone necklace named you “Kaye”;
your tan was richly oiled, as if burnished more
by hand than sun. A teenager flashed by,
his skateboard growling come-ons as he eyed
your heaving breasts. I wondered, too, how your
caress might feel, if not to me, then to another.
Around you glowed the plinkering arcade,
like summer carnivals where I played straight.
“Stop it—hey, you’re hurting me.” I smothered
her, desperate to remake myself, her body
so soft I prayed it might accept me, hold
impressions long enough to be retold
as truth. Kaye, I wanted to so badly
I made myself forget what you must know:
You turn to him, so awkwardly bent back,
too beautiful to resist, the night gone black,
and offer your unyielding, human soul
stretched taut—forgiving him, forgiving us.
