Don’t tell me that by having one’s body splayed
across the centerfold, or on a quack work of art,
like slab meat, one has prostituted one’s self.
For by merely sitting here, pen in hand,
a coffee cup on a paper doily steaming nearby,
I have, in my silence, whored myself to words.
For at times, I have no power over what takes me.
Every word, every verse seduces me senseless
until nights have become as colored as a harem.
And yet, in the morning, unable to make them mine,
I watch them put on their shirts, pull on their jeans
and go elsewhere.
