The Dirty Days of April

[Andrea345]

Happily Ever After

All Happily Ever After's end in heartbreak. Someone will always die
after the final page of the book, or in the unwritten scene three months
or forty-five years away. There will be a cancer, or a heart which stops,
a stubbed toe which leads to a fall, or a slow withering is all it will take.
Love stories would have us believe that infinity begins with a kiss,

or that our love will last beyond a natural life, and float to a garden
beyond the pain of mourning, or the endlessness of grief. Poets
would have you believe that in love you are safe from the worms crawling
through drained hearts, or the beetles feeding iridescence off of your love's
fingers and toes. Our story, we believe, should not end with maggots,

but it will. It will. And yet, we should still look our lover in the eye as they
hold out their own death in their arms. We should embrace it, along with their
withering as their lips touch ours. One can be safe, but not loved after you run
from the pain of the blow-flies, or escape the snap of carrion-beetle. Love
is not forgetting or forgiveness, but embracing the dirt to which we all will return.
 



******************** John *********************************
Thank you very much for your comments.

[Andrea345]

Love, Lust, and Sex after Sixty

Inspired by the photography of David Steinberg's,
"Erotic by Nature", "This Thing We Call Sex: Juliet-Victor"

The first returns on a Google search are either "fragile uterine walls,"
or "erectile dysfunction" (which is, of course, shorted to "ED" but you,
as a woman will get the whole freakin' phrase bestowed like a torch
on a mound of tinder). They never mention, though, that while
your breasts will sag with age, your nipples can still grow hard as pearls,
or that once you know the path to your orgasm, you can come like a train
through the empty plains of the Dakotas. His hands are soft now against

your belly and his fingers pluck at that nipple with the same interest
he had when he was twenty. And you, you love to feel the pump of his blood
through his cock, especially after that stillness in his forties, and the fear
he'd never rise to purple again. But his appetite changed - once again -
and he grew hungry. Now time has passed and you stroke him past blush
into plum and you're unafraid to use your mouth, or your feet, and he is free
now to use a cock-ring instead of worry. You jack him hard, you both end up
laughing, glad that you've bested twenty in the forty years you've been together.

[Andrea345]

Live

Year One you fight about toothpaste, parties and friends
who mooch a buck or five; steal your booze your blow,
but who's counting? The crashes never end and neither
do the threats of "I won't stand for..." which is always
"anything more." The second year is accommodation,
and glad-handing, patting yourselves on the back you've
made The Commitment, you've "Lasted" the year, and you've
no fear of it ever ending. All's good. All's good. There's
no problem at all... nothing to discuss.. no rabbit in that hat.
You're twenty-six, what's to be said about Everlasting Love
you'll write in a blog, and post a fuzzy photo where you're dressed
in white with an apple pie recipe and pictures of your Easter shoes
you cobbled from vegetarian cotton stalks which are all the rage.

You give me ten. You're thirty-five and now the fights are real.
The odds are 10:1 you'll last the year, much less see the next decade.
He works late. You work long hours. No one's home for the children.
There aren't any in this story, but there could be, but that chime
hasn't struck - yet. Who gets laid off is the next topic for discussion
and rises like a zombie after you've already hit "Pay" on the plane tickets
to Venice. In September. When the weather's perfect and you can still
sit on the Piazza San Marco and hear the orchestras competing at sunset.

And then another five passes. He never comes when you call, or even
gets hard when you go down. You remember that last time his cheeks
flushed strawberry and he rose above you so demanding, so strong,
so face to face and it makes you want to cry that that will no longer belong
to your life any longer. At least, that's what they say in all the stories online -
for the first five pages. Another six pass and you've put on weight. Your gait
is stilted. You've been working long hours and never rise from your desk.
Your blog is six Easters dead. You ran out of recipes, sewing projects,
and canning tips. Your hips are the only thing with hip left. You need touch-ups,
but now grey is in fashion, but not the grow-out. The grow-out still isn't cool.

Two more and you hit the Magic Twenty-Five. Someone's supposed to send
you paper or some sort shit. You just want an orgasm, and he eats you out.
You now want sex as much as he did in year three when you were weary
and suffering from yeast infections if you had sex more than twice a week.
Still, the next five pass just fine and getting finer because forty-nine is sunshine
and roses - until the heart attack. And this doesn't shock you because by now
you know that there is nothing to know about the life you share. He might be there,
but you could be gone in an instant. So many friends have divorced at the drop
of a penny, a nickel, a dime, much less something as expensive as a Stetson hat.

And he's much, much more than that. It's now thirty-five years and you've lived
so many more years longer together than ever alone or with your family. How.
Can. A. Person. Be. Individual? And now time passes even more quickly because
even if you fight, he should be reading your fucking mind by now for fuck's sake -

and he doesn't. But you've had too many good days to count. Laughter counts.
A garden in full bloom - counts. Beautiful Children, not so much. You could divorce
when they leave for school, but great window treatments you both chose, or he
gives good pedicure? That's irreplaceable, along with kindness, understanding,
and an occasional sense of humor at your repetitious ask of, "I didn't hear what
you said. Can you repeat that?" You rub his back and pick at the pimples.

He'll bring your bourbon and ice up to your desk. You have a dog.
A mortgage. A bed. It's just not over. And you could never write
a blog about what fucking him feels like after thirty years.

[Jee Leong]

Love the image for knowing the path to your orgasm. Lol! Good stuff in "Live." I'm only at Year Five, so have all that to look forward to.

[BrianIsSmilingAtYou]

"Live" is some powerful stuff.

I think "of" is missing before "shit" in

you paper or some sort shit.

Good read.

BrianIs AtYou

[Andrea345]

Paris
          not in Springtime

(inspired by the photograph, "Paris," by David Peterman)

He is alabaster decanted into French Blue,
the hue of lapis lazuli ground into oil. He floats
in the deep black, sipping tea from porcelain
rimmed in gold. He holds the saucer just so
in his gloved hands. His form is all elegant twist
and slender hips, his nipples barely concealed
by the halter. There is nothing warm about a fish
such as he, except his red coxcomb of hair.


*****************Thanks, Jee & Brian! *****************

[Andrea345]

This rough draft was written before midnight PST

Field notes from an erotic art exhibition
    or
The observation of art ic u latory phonetics
     in the mas tur
batoRY exer
tions      complete with notation
of naaaaaa sal exhal aaaaaa
tions
and description of effluvent
erup
tions

by a

           phono phono phonological
linguist

[Andrea345]

From the 25th... It sure as hell ain't done. Yesterday was quite successful at the Art Festival. I met David Steinberg, whose work I've admired for quite awhile, and has actually been the source of several poems, including one in this NaPo. I had no idea he was coming. It was so cool to be able to show him "The Garden" (from last year's NaPo) and this year's rough draft on "Sex after Sixty." I also met Michael Rosen (warning link NSFW), who, well, asked to meet me if that can be believed. He's the photographer whose work, "robert and Robert" I wrote about in this NaPo. I gave him one of my printout cards and he's going to send me a copy of the photograph and actually wants it included in my card! I'm all like, "Wow!"

So, my brain officially exploded yesterday and I'm recovering today, so I've just got place holder pieces:

From the 25th:
Green is the color of skin
in the aureola

From today
His heart is a hollow sphere, an iridescent surface which captured
the warmth of my breath at our first kiss. The ease with which
he might rupture

[delph_ambi]

‘Love, Lust, and Sex after Sixty’ and ‘Live’ are superb. Wonderful poems.

[Andrea345]

Today's half-assed few lines. agh!

The sperm have it right, starting over
is starting out and you're back to one in a million
swimming the stream again in search
of the golden egg which will have you.





*************

delph - thank you for letting me know. In the deep dark end of April, I seem to only be able to squirt a few lines now, so it's good to hear that the earlier works were workable. Thanks

[Andrea345]

Well, I seem to have changed topics after the Art Festival. I can't seem to do death and grief on warm spring days, either. Returning now to XXX work

A fantasy always begins with the improbable,
so here she lay on a red topped table, each limb
bound to a corner with black leather cuffs lined
with thick, red satin. She was a cliché for some,
but for herself - she was unexplored territory,
an unmapped world. When she gave herself
permission, she gave herself over to the touch
foreign hands, the stroke of strange fingers.

She might never have another lover again, but
there were other forms of caress, of prick, of bite.
She would take a different kind of kiss. And so,
at sixty-three, she laid herself upon the table - bare,
soft, and let the mapping begin of her territory.

[Scrow]

Yay!

'Love, lust...' And 'Live' are really excellent, and not just excellent but I really, really enjoyed reading them. It's the details that do it for me- the 'window treatments' and pimple picking, the cock ring and narrative of sex. sex not frozen as one preserved moment, but a window on a narrative sequence of it. Yay!

'Fantasy' is nice, too. I love the idea of N as 'cliche for some...but an unmapped world'. lovely.

Thank you. I really enjoyed reading these.

Sarah

[Andrea345]

"Without scary, we don't get to be brave."
Quicken Loans Spot "Buy In"


Maybe this is why all romances are written with "Happily for Now"
because when love dies, you're disemboweled. The knife shoves in
and draws slowly up through the soft center of your body. You pray
for the heart to be pierced, for the quick death. But the next day
marches on and you still have breath. So we tell ourselves the fairy tales
of love, avoiding the thirty-five or forty-year after. Happily, or not
is never the topic of that conversation. The first forty seconds though
contains what your stomach knows, and its bottom drops out - full
with your kiss, your scent, the taste of your breath. The stomach
knows what hunger is. It remembers. It knows that abundance
never lasts past tomorrow and it remembers the growl of want.

And yet we proceed against the very warnings of our belly. We move
forward each day closer to this disaster of desire, this want of you
and you're gone - whether you're dead, or found love with yet another.
Both are the same blade in the stomach and you will never, ever
be retrieved. I will never again be filled with you. And yet we proceed -
foolishly begging with each kiss, caress, each orgasm of joy to please,
please, please have all of our happiness killed before us. What is love
but giving someone the knife; holding their hand to place its point
between the esophagus and the spleen and hoping with all
your childhood dreams that they will push the blade all the way through.

You live to die before the death of your love. They call you brave on your bed,
but instead, you smile, wave a hand, kiss a cheek, and let your eyes go grey. 



*******************************************
Sarah, thank you so much for your kind comments. I'm glad you didn't require antibiotics after reading.

[5th column]

Hi Andrea. Posting issues and work have delayed my return but here I am reading strong and honest stuff.

As always I enjoy your work and the frankness of "Live" is made more enjoyable by recognizing some of it. And just a word for the joy of "Field Notes" I laughed and admired the structure and pacing. Excellent.

Its been a pleasure reading you again.

[Andrea345]

Twelve Reasons to Avoid Love

1) Disease transmission
2) Bank overdraft
3) Weight gain after breakup
4) Smoking habit after breakup
5) He / she / it will cheat on you with him / her / it.
6) ewwww gross! I never wanted that ^ idea in my brain. I can't scrub it out now!
7) They might bite their toenails ( pick their nose) (eat their ear wax... I saw that on TV once)
8) Their credit score is worse than mine.
9) What if they never give me an orgasm?
10) Can I read how to find my orgasm with them in the room?
11) He's Sagittarius. I'm Pisces. We'd make goat fucking fish... or fish fucking goats. We're incompatible.
12) What if I can only orgasm with them in the room? Isn't that entrainment or entrapment or something?

I am so fucked.


****************
5th...
I am so happy you didn't drop dead at your desk. Thanks for letting me know you still live and the work wasn't lethal. 'preciate it mucha.
-a