StarPoet Newsletter Vol. X, No. XLIV

Men are somewhat more
Than a convenient way to do the heavy lifting;
Garden variety feminist Marxism
Would have us live without testosterone,
Each of us becoming some womanish imitation
Of the great Mother Goddess,
Living in our perfectly constructed worlds
Of particpatory Democracy,
Where each of us speaks no evil and hears nothing
But the carefully modulated tones of the High Priestess.

No men, no women, a civilization of grayly clothed maos
And their divinely appointed leaders,
A world where we parse each sentence
For any hint of elitism or patriarchy;
A human existence in which menstrual flows do not exist,
All the good men possess full, pendulous breasts,
And babies are the product
Of goverment supported laboratories.

Amidst the tattoo parlors and condom boutiques,
The transgender she-male hookers separating the johns from their money,
The hopeless mix of runaways, social outcasts, and free range bedlam,
The half-stoned clubbers and suburban thrill seekers
Out for their night on the wild side,
A post-op transsexual on her way to a concert is just one more woman,
One more target of opportunity for the muggers and desperate addicts,
Albeit one who can tell the boys from the girls.
No wonder so many of us prefer the quietude of the married life,
Withdrawing from the mean streets of our youthful exuberance
To the relative safety of pair bonding, raising children, and keeping house,
And the comforting pleasures of the old in-out in-out with our spouses and husbands.

Past the apartment renovations and the all night laundromats,
The glassy broken sidewalks are lined with decaying splendor,
Memories of great dance halls and small rock and roll clubs
Where Eddie Cochran opened for Charles Hardin Buddy Holley,
Where the Stones couldn't sell out the house on their first American tour,
And where I wore that green dress when we saw the Beau Brummels
And you stayed over deep into morning, my partner in sin.

I first touched snow
  When I was almost twenty,
In Tahoe, with the Newman Club,
  On a weekend sensitivity session
After having seen it on the Sierras
  From the valley, from Sacramento,
Most everday before then but summer.

I watched as the flakes fell
  On my tongue and on my blouse,
Wishing I had a boyfriend
  Who could share this historic movement
Before the April sun melted
  All the magic into mud.

As I watch my dog I realize
He is aging faster than I am,
A fact I truly hope he doesn't notice
Before that last final descent
That will bring tears to both our eyes.

My father, at my age,
Had surrendered to the inevitable
And was counting out his days
Cigarette by cigarette, bottle after bottle
Of this week's vintage of sweet sauterne.

I will not go gladly from this earth
-- I am not my father,
Even if I had his sadness
(And I do have good glimmer
  of the demons he fought against);
I will not be driven into the darkness
As long as these words don't fail me.

There's a mugger, on the corner,
Drinking Starbuck's Capuccino,
Sipping coffee, watching women,
Waiting for his next victim;
 
He's wearing a tee shirt, he's wearing faded levis,
He's wearing a dark red denim jacket,
Oh he's so cool, so totally modern,
A high class mugger looking for his women.

The sun, both late and early,
Constrains the fragile daylight,
Minute by minute, hour by hour,
Plunging us wildly
Towards the winter solstice.
The days grow ever darker
Along the northern continent,
Dragging with them my unwilling soul,
Before the sun finally flings us out
To Spring, to summer,
And the hope of life eternally reborn.

The sun plays catch me,
Rain and clouds dodging,
Suggesting, at times,
A day far crisper than
The well mugged warm air
That clings damply
To my blouse and lungs,
Discouraging our enthusiasm
For any moments of bright clarity
Teasingly presented us.

The winter seems perpetual sunset,
Darkness through the day,
Hastening the solstice star rise.

The sun shines reluctantly,
Preferring to spend its energy
Down under.

My life should chase the fleeing sun,
North in March, South in September,
Or spend my days in stationary orbit,
The sun's rays perpetually shining.

Today, the left side of my body
   Has decided to be weak,
A condition my nervous system
   Efficiently informs me
With a dull, low grade ache
   That constantly lurks in the background
Of leg, shoulder, arm, and back.