IT CATCHES YOUR GUT

like a fishhook
baited by an old
& patient angler
& deftly cuts you
and out spills
an intestine's worth
of memories; a bowel
of inane blather; a fly ball
lost in the sun.

And there you are
flopping around
on a wet deck
blood smeared & useless
save for your goddamned history:
almost rolling a 300; making it
with a heavy legged waitress
at the end
of her shift; endless nights
and endless breasts and endless beasts
that you commanded and told where to sit
& when...and now
nothing, being tricked
by the cheap lure
of loneliness
as another organ
gets pulled from you and you
can hardly even moan.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2017

I WOULD WANT YOU

with me
always
watching
Greek fishermen
wearing thick-ribbed
blue sweaters
& watch-caps
wash salt
from their eyes
& talk to me
of childhood
flights.

The Aegean's net
of kelp & foam
catches our brine soaked fingers
like crazy minnows scurrying
between light shafts & toes
while danger plays
across my lower lip
waiting for your teeth
to bite
& coax a ribbon of red
to bathe in.
We can finger paint
each other's name
on our cheeks
in blood
& lick each letter
with menstrual madness.

I will not write again
(to you.)


Until I do.

Norman Savage
Greenwich Village, 2016