"The Boys of Slender Means," "La Ronde," and "On Forms"

The Boys of Slender Means

We’re mayflies tricked skyward by stadium lights;
you’re floodwater blind to the corpse it turns.
                                                                 Teacher,

shrugged out of metaphor, we showed you what we are:
just boys, chubbed & troubled in your meaty hands.

            We had little:              we had that much.

            oh cloudswells            or clouded wells

After, friendless, you hungered on. Once in the sway of
our narrow hips, did you believe a you-and-we

would rise, each summer’s swarm bound
to the tired heaven of your porch light’s glow?

            Game on:                   we’re the score.

            shotgun kiss               loser’s wish

Fat man, too heavy to cross our cloud-bridge, we hold
our letting go.  See how we leave you (leaving some

battered wingless in the porch light’s dingy globe). 

La Ronde

You know something, kid? You’re pretty stupid,
he said, pulled up his running shorts, and ran.
Come-drunk, stunned, my car keys lost in the grass,
hurled from my teen-slut paradise by words

he said, I pulled up my running shorts, ran
up and down the levee, clawing the ground.
Hurled from my teen-slut paradise by words,
I cursed him, me, and every dick I’d sucked

up and down the levee. Clawing the ground,
I cringed at telling Dad I’d lost the keys
(again!), cursed him, me, every dick I’d sucked.
Why did it always have to be this way?

I cringed at telling Dad—I’ve lost my keys.
A jogger slowed, ambled down, smiled at me.
Why did it always have to be this way?
I sank to my knees, tugged at his waistband,

come-drunk, stunned, my car keys lost in the grass.
The joggers slow, amble down, smile at me.
I sink to my knees, tug at their waistbands.
You know something, man? You’re pretty stupid.

On Forms

Your ass looks just like I thought it would—
Mike, ex-merchant marine, to me, fourteen,
phenomenal flicker of my puerile form
quickened by his glance, made real in his words.

Mike, ex-merchant marine, to me, fourteen:
my first, my taker, my erotic maker.
Quickened by his glance, made real in his words,
I thought I knew myself, thought this is it,

my first, my taking, my erotic making.
Form is change; the one succumbs to the many.
I think I know myself, think this is it
every time I undress for another man.

Forms change, each one succumbing to the many
shifting shades of my needs, and mine to theirs,
every time I undress for another man.
Fourteen: turn your back to me, pull them down—

shifting shades of my needs, and Mike’s, and yours.
Fifty: turn your back to me, pull them down.
Phenomenal flickering-out of puerile form:
your ass looks just like I thought it would.