SELF-PORTRAITAT THIRTY-THREE

SELF-PORTRAITAT THIRTY-THREE

Conceding the time now past for a tragically early death, resigned that, at thirty-three, the blood-drops coughed up on the white pillow, the purple angel’s crystal tears falling over Grodek, the final quarrel with God in a tavern brawl, the death by water out of Livorno with no guitar, Ariel’s strident emotional angst, are not for me:

of crucifying age, I gladly would spread out my arms, climb up onto a tree; yet God seems to have let

this cup pass from me: marking time until my death in some puny war of liberation, or until the epic promised for my blind old age, I find I still can emit a drop of crystal lubrication at the mere mention of sex -

just like an adolescent.