Vacuum Love
Because I cannot reach and touch you with
My hand or lips, my love remains the gray
Of ashes and of cancelled god-filled myth.
Divinity is elsewhere like the spray
Of neutered tomcats, visible only
To queen cat noses. It is that perfume
That leaves behind doomed maleness, lonely
In alleyways of life, a scentless doom.
Because I cannot lick you with my tongue,
My love for you is judged to be as bad
As undertaker’s fluid in the young
Veins of an AIDS-death victim, not just sad—
Revolting really. Since I cannot kiss,
I live forever in this life of hiss.