THE LOVE SONG THAT IS HEROIN

is like a Billie & Lester duet...

is like sin caressing the anxious blood...

Her nipples sore
from her baby's greed.
She knew he'd grow
into his need
and take advantage
of every extended tit
and suckle until enough warmth
lined his belly...

My flesh
awaits yours;
my lips taste
your taste.
An old man
whose memories
are almost as dry as a twig
yet spill what little sap is left
into a feverish enterprise
of grief.
History's bastard,
a slow rendition
of want...

I know I'm a sucker
for pain,
and have a cavernous sweet tooth
for memory.
And what else is memory
if not a seductive trip
down a mine field
that always leads
to loss...

Now these old bones rattle
from a barren cold
and what else
beside the blast furnace
of a flower
that swells & drips its honey
into a spoon that swirls
the spillage of time
into a hot brew
that thaws & forgives the mind
while it coats & soothes
the stomach
will suffice?

Just leave me alone
& let me drift...
on a reed.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2019

THE LOVE OF LADIES WHO BURN...SCALD...AND SCORCH

Joni sings
in the shower
while I play
in the damp news
of yesterday.
Coffee bounces
up from sleepy beds
of conflict
& balm
as her moist skin
exudes fragrance
like rare orchids
in an overheated
hothouse...

I'll read
to Toni
tonight
her own words
from the mouth
of a white man
drunk
on her rhythms
of the heart's coal
& diamonds...

There's Simone,
both Nina & deBeauvoir,
pointing with acid tongues
new tastes in extremes
of language glued
to the affairs of men
doomed & tragic
and forever
joyful...

& Billie
of course
turning & twisting love
around her tongue
until, even I,
can hear it
for the first time
again
& again
& again...

And then
there is
you.
The one
who hums
inside,
constant,
a metronome
of want;
the blue tangle
of legs
& after sex smoke
from cigarettes
drifting lazily,
as gentle as wisps
drawn from Miles' Spanish horn;
who I whisper to
in the dark embers
of the night.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2017

FIRSTS:

Asking Maxine out
for a hot fudge ice-cream sundae
when I was six and summoning up
the courage to take her hand
on our secret path back home;
swimming without my father's arms
underneath me & feeling the waters pull;
surfing on asphalt on a tar spun Brooklyn street,
the training wheels off
with only my own power & balance to guide me;
a hardball sliding into my Rawlings oiled glove
and hitting a liquid smart drive on the fat of the bat;
having courage in the darkness
& the high spun arc of magisterial wide screen technicolor
coming on at once like LSD kid style; melted popcorn
oozing between my fingers licking the tips;
the first time my dick moved straight up
all by itself;
the first time I mastered making a bridge
so the pool cue slid easily between my fingers;
the first time the ball touched nothing
but twine and the swoosh it made;
the first touch of silk;
or the smell of my dog wet
from the spring rains;
the first time I saw Corinne
and moved toward her without
knowing why; the first smell
from a mimeograph machine or
gasoline pump, paper solvent
or horse manure or man sweat
after a summer's football game
on the beach; the first pull
on a stick of reefer or opium pipe
and the snake that slithered up
my spine and around my shoulders
and up into my brain;
the first time I realized Coltrane
or Monk or Miles or Billie or Nina;
the first time I knew I really existed
and found the keys into Joyce's pocket;
sighting Diane behind a glove counter & knew
how love can come from behind and mug you.
It has been a long slow kiss
to the fates and it has been
sublime.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2017

NICE

to have thought of you
yesterday; the city ripe
and waiting
to be eaten,
as the air parted
to allow the sparest
of spirits
through; even the grass
dribbled semen
out the earth's
brittle cunt singing
into the hollows
of ears
attuned
to every and any
rumbling. How we go
in the eye's blaze,
all fire engine truth
& sanitarium green,
drifting on reeds
of failure
& fortune.

Funny
how the soul
shakes to the quick
syncopation
of fears
imagined.
How you,
hero or
heroine,
without knowing it,
fall back
on your own
petard
like Billie
handcuffed
to her hospital bed
wondering where
her next gig
was coming
from & what
sweet song
will make love
inside
her mouth
next.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2015

BLUES

Saturday night descends
like Elvin Jones
around my shoulders
as darkness supplies
the masturbatory comfort---
I look for signs:
The Daily News gets fucked,
and acquitted;
Agnew found stroking it
and coming
for the first time;
Richard reprimands him
for sticking to business;
Sartre blames his mother...
this is CRAZY
this IS absurd
to stop in the
m
i
d
d
l
e
of a sentence
finding each word
lacks the meaning
you thought
it had.

I reach
for my albums
to give myself
a chance;
like now,
Lady Day
to end the fever
shoots me
full of
medicine.

Norman Savage
Coney Island, 1970