We sit comfortably in the coffee shop
perched atop
long elegant stools and
a couple of socioeconomic classes.

The conversation and snow descend gently
and we stir and smile
and dazzle each other with our
total lack of imagination.

God bless our little hearts

I mention that I’m a fine swimmer, hoping
she’ll appreciate my
candour and simplicity.

I mention that I’m against world
hunger, poverty, famine, peace, trade
inequality and tsunamis.

She smiles at me and says,
“That’s so marvellous.”

Outside the buildings are staggered
teeth in a jaw.
And the cars in the snow slide by
silently and the sugar dissolves in my coffee.

And she’s like cost-effective advertising
making me remember a dream I had,
or a dream I was having.

In the office buildings, a couple of coworkers
recycle air and passion.
The photocopy machine
like a strobe light on staggered successes.

In the apartment buildings, the proles hump each other
under heavy laundry lines, their bodies
so crushed under the weight of the Man.
Their pelvic thrusts
only minor gradations from rest.

Or the high-rise where lithe forms
bend each other over
bullshit metal furniture,

screwing each other with icy stares and
reach-around smiles.

The city communicates through love and contagion

And I offer a smile so bright to jeopardize the moon.
And I offer a smile so bright for those who can’t afford the weather.

And I offer myself up to her freely
to the roll dice against my sexual potency.

Oh, God bless bless bless my little heart

I tell her my destiny
to be a captain of industry,
a pillar of the community,
a voice of resistance,
a poet of witness.

Or

My future as a drunk and uncivil civil servant,
middle-aged and middle-managed,
unprofitably employed as a non-movie star or a
musician without a record contract.

Oh, but god bless my little heart,

beating irregularly
with the rhythm of a bad dancer.

Cool romance in cold winter.
“Let’s go home and make love like people who don’t dream.
Like two hands missing each other in the darkness.
Too much between you and me,
two lives that have seen no clemency.”

Love making born in Texas USA
Love making in the key of B flat
....

She had a way of looking at my penis very seriously

As if it had written a play of considerable merit

Regarding the human condition