MILLION HANDS
Published by MARGUERITE hnteves@gmail.com ©2018
She, She, She– why is She so much on everyone’s mind? Surprise! Throw up your hands like dancers! I am much larger than one She! My breasts, my enormous hips, my round face, all Nothing but Them! Not She, nor Him, and if I was built like one or the other, then rebuilding my Self should be damn easy.
How do I write a goddamn gay poem! How can I not write the word gay, where are the others! Why do I know one or three names, their queerness a nail on their fourth finger, a thing like an earring loose in a purse, why can I not claim them, say Hello! You’ve not been lost! You are mine! You are ours! You can call yourself whatever you want! You can help me write all of the words you could not! We can put them in a goddamn poem together, you & I!
Forever, ever and ever, ever on darling, baby-darling, we shall see each other! New and old, untouched, no face or breasts or phalluses just HANDS! Just a million hands, only a million, ever and ever, touching and holding and kissing with palms and no lips, til we wake up in another’s bodies, or fall asleep, like when carried, or held into the house as children, and then it is only a few hundred, or ten or thousand, years til I see you again.
My hair has been cut! I sat swinging my legs while it fell like big palm leaves after storms or lots of wind. I am not Samson, in fact I am the opposite because it fell to the ground cut by a woman & I stood & suddenly I was taller, suddenly I was harder & stronger & my heart grew & hit the sides of my chest. & my partner likes my hair short & everything is lighter.
I should not write poetry about my partner’s body during the times we are together, but God, I understand all of them now! All the songs & poems & portraits of nude people lounging on beds & staring at the artist, lit by some fancy glass lamp & looking morose or seductive but they were probably thinking about What Robert should make for dinner when this job is over? & the person doing the art is thinking How am I going to make this look good? or I’ve run out of space in this corner, shit! But when I look at A– looking at me, & their eyes are big round bowls & their neck is going THRUM THRUM & their breasts! Oh Lord, all those priests were right! I am going to hell!
My brother innocent says whole-heart love happens and he does not care bad, writes on garage or cave wall or does not write simply draws simply touches with eyes or gives white-yellow and wishes well. Words for this are wrong. Brother loves and does not, does not need to speak this because I know.
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