JUST ASKIN'

What runs through her mind
as she decides
to fuck me?

Does she wait
for her molecules to heat
or is it more of a calculation
of need?

How does her body
shout at her; what demands
does it make?

How does it oil itself?

How does her thighs widen
in welcome; her lips moisten?

Or does terror seize the moment?
Contracting vice-like
her senses that allow
no pleasure, no acknowledgement
of nature's reward
for civilization's fascism?

Does she know
and does it matter
if it's me
inside her
& what part
of me is
inside her?

And does she expect
a bloody rose
or crucifixtion
afterwards?

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2019

FUCK WALTER MISCHEL

and his marshmellow test.
Who in their right mind
would wait a year to eat
two marshmellows when
you can eat one now?
And that's supposed to tell me
who will cure cancer
and who will die of cancer?
Gimme the marshmellow
now. I've been
a heat seeking
guided pleasure missle
before I knew what pleasure was:
put a bag of dope,
a scotch neat,
a jelly bean or two or three, or a hundred thousand,
or Milky Way,
a piece of ass, a pair of tits,
three of a kind, or Royal Flush,
even a parting of lips
in front of me,
and I'm a gonner.
How about a warm apple pie
cradling a Hagan-Daz scoop of vanilla--
I'd crawl over my mother
to get next to that.
Wait a year!? Are you outta yer mind!?
I want to get the fuck outta me now,
motherfucker. What is pleasure about?
I want to lose myself; I want to get lost:
Lost in wine, in women, in poetry, in song.
That is how you find things
out. You lose control, you go crazy...
for a second, a week, a month, years.
Unfortunately,
most don't.
What horrible lives
they must lead.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2017

"TAKE A BREAK"

for j. and in spite of her...

she said to me.
"Gimme a minute...
I need to get this shit
down," I answered.
"You said that
an hour ago...
it's my Sunday, too."
"A minute,
just a minute,"
I promised.
"Now, Savage,
I need some
attention
now."
"It's still early,
night's young."
"But not you;
your shelf life
is almost expired
and I've got an itch
that needs scratchin."
"Come over here," I parried.
"Seriously,
take a break; this cat
needs to purr."
Black women
are different
than white:
they get up
in your face
and no "no's"
placate
or appease.
"C'mon Daddy do
what you do."
"Fuckit,"
I said
without
letting her
hear it.
Beside
she had
a better way
with life
than I did.
And I'm simply
not that much
of an artist
or fascist.
I shut-off
the Mac
and did
what any man
would do:
obeyed.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2014