Satie

Echoing the vein, the pang:
the slow lightning, the gentle
catastrophe, nothing

as purple was ever said.
Had I been stroking
his cloudy beard,

taken his glasses off,
scalpelled his heart out,
it wouldn’t have given me this.

I couldn’t burn
more slowly. You are
eating your sallad

in retrograde, lifting
stains with your mouth.
Tongue ever more

tasteless, hands growing
shyer, smaller,
infinitely retreating, breathing

in. Every fifth year the sun
expands, every fifth year
exhales.

Reaching an empty
stomach, so it might begin
again. It doesn’t help.

Satie is always
delayed. Like my age,
dreaming of unspoiled

fruit, a healthy seed,
neutral to music, the prejudice,
all our love, and taking

its time. Fine cigars
appease us, stately names,
e-mail replies

from presidents. Our bodies
never were in such wealth,
never so photographed.

Worshipping wounds
grown invisible,
we put on

our dresses
and another CD
of Satie –

Lunch will ever come,
will ever throw
dressing on our trousers.

How non-metaphorical
were those headaches
brought on by sullied clothes?

How far from a Jesus stain
in your crotch, the singing
which cannot stop.