one night stand before the house committee on un-american activities
tied to me, you were red tape.
I had only known you for one day.
but like the ivy blooming you smeared
a trail of red that spared my writing
the terrible trap of honesty.
it was instant attraction, you stuck with me,
and I was caught in the tack of your coils
as you spoke, like a razor wire tangle.
you cut as an editor should, and knowing,
I hung myself with your damask sinew.
bowdlerized, my poems gasped like a
pretty young back-alley mugging,
black and purple in the name of someone’s bread.
they dragged crimson flutters like an eviscerated dog,
moaning and bleeding the fuel of every good thing.
as you wrapped your ribbon legs
around my well-bred truthful lines
I barely caught the scent of office paint.
you tied those truths off with a smirk,
while I spoke with the ghost of Lester Cole.
you meant well. you wanted me to test you,
to push against your good intentions.
Born Free, I pushed, and in my fifties pinko logic
I thought that you were strong enough.
you said, “to censor is to love.”
but like the sticky seal on the fold of some
cold-headed document, you broke under my thumb.
I had one wish on that second, spine-broke day:
god, with my words, and in all my loveless sex,
save me from the death of good ideals.
No Comments Yet