Wondrous the Merge




Had my soul tottered off to sleep
taking my potency with it?
Had they both retired before I could
leaving me a classroom somnambulist?
Why else should I at sixty-one
feel myself shriveling into fadeout?

Then on a cold seminar Monday
in walked an unannounced redeemer
disguised as a taciturn student
Brisk and resolute in scruffy mufti
he set down his backpack  shook his hair
and offered me unequivocal devotion

He dismissed my rebuffs and ultimatums
He scoffed at suggestions of disaster
He insisted he had been given authority
to provide my future happiness
Was it possible he had been sent
from some utopian headquarters?

I went to his flat to find out


*                *           *


He had two red dogs   a yellow cat
a girl roommate    an ex boyfriend
and a bedroom ceiling covered
with blue fluorescent stars
But he was ready to renounce anything
that would not accommodate me

He said I held the key to his existence
He said he knew when he first saw me
that I was the reason for his birth
He claimed that important deities
had opened his head three times
to place my star in his brow

This is preposterous      I said
I have a wife in the suburbs
I have mortgages    children    in-laws
and a position in the community

I thoroughly sympathize        said He
Why else have I come to your rescue?

These exchanges gave me diarrhea
I tried leaving town on business
but I kept remembering the warmth
that flowed through his healing fingers
We met for lunch at Hamburger Mary's
and borrowed a bedroom for the afternoon.

He brought a bouquet of red roses
and a ruby-fat jug of red wine
He hung affection around my neck
and massaged the soles of my feet
He offered to arrange instant honeymoons
and guarantee the connecting flights

Are you mad?    I said    You are half my age
Are you frightened of your fate?      said He


*          *            *

At Beck's Motel on the 7th April
we went to bed for three days
disheveled the king size sheets
never changed the Do Not Disturb
ate only the fruits of discovery
drank semen and laughter and sweat

He seasoned my mouth
   sweetened my neck
   coddled my nipple
   nuzzled my belly
   groomed my groin
   buffed my buttock
   garnished my pubes
   renovated my phallus
   remodeled my torso
until I cried out
until I cried
   I am      Yes
   I am   your Yes
   I am    I am    your
   Yes    Yes     Yes

*         *          *

He took a studio of his own
on the windward slope of Potrero
where I spent afterschool hours
uprooting my ingrown niceties
and planting fresh beds of bliss
His sheets were grassy green


*        *            *

    In his long bathtub
    he sat me opposite him
    and scrubbed away my guilt
    With a breakfast of sunbursts
    he woke the sleeping princess
    in my castle of armor

    Waving blueprints of daring
    for twin heroes
    he roused my rusty knighthood

    To the choked minstrel
    aching my throat
    he proferred concerts of praise

    Off the tip of his tongue
    I took each tasty love word
    and swallowed it whole
    for my own

Are you my Book of Miracles?   I said
Are you my Boddhisattva?     said He


*        *            *


Ablaze in the thrust of desire
we scathed each other with verve
burned up our fears of forever
streamed ourselves deep in surrender
till I lay drenched under scorch
and joy cried out through my crown

Wondrous    Wondrous the merge
Wondrous the merge of soulmates
the surprises of recognition
Wondrous the flowerings of renewal
Wondrous the wings of the air
clapping their happy approval

*        *            *

I severed my respectabilities
and bought a yellow mobile home
in an unlikely neighborhood
He moved in his toaster   his camera
and his eagerness to become
my courier    seed-carrier    and consort

Above all he brought the flying carpet
that upholsters his boundless embrace
Year after year he takes me soaring
out to the ecstasies of the cosmos
that await all beings in love

One day we shall not bother to return

1982

James Broughton
from Ecstacies: 1970-1986