Poém, Jan. 2010

CINEMA PATHETIQUE: COURT M´ETRAGE


The only weighty human touch
I’ve had in the last six months

is from my reflexologist, his torch
hot fingers release toxins—

bad subfusc coloured Qi back
into thirsty downtown mouths.

Jump cut. No, I lied. The moxie
masseuse in the two stroke

hotel spa in Portugal. Take my tannins
to the curb, please. Pressed clutch

to speed away, fast. That bubble bloke
on the corner of Tavira and Lisboa

stepping on every dead uncouth
diabetic nerve-end. I lied, it was in Sinaloa

when I mistook Mexico for lunch—
mole con pollo, Zapatista cabins,

and corridas calientes. I also lied
about the metaphors—trope tricks

bought at the healer’s toll booth, now smooth
of meaning. No alternative to touch—