The Mistress
The Mistress
I heard a young shapely woman
say in a warehouse once
that the main course
is nothing
without the side,
she was talking to
a married man
and while we
were waiting in line
she bent over
to show him
and coincidentally us
(the innocent truck driving bystanders)
everything
but the bottom of what her g-string
was holding.
It’s like
most women
have forgotten the secret
that to keep a man wanting
you’ve got to leave something
up to the imagination
and this one
has
always
kept me guessing.
1700 and 55 miles
to this desert
then
to
Burbank
where she taught me
the discipline of preparation
inorder to meet
her weekly demands
and
just tonight
as I run my fingertips
through her buttery soft hair
she stares back at me
and asks,
“Do you even care?”
A question
of such a rhetorical nature
can only be answered
with an explicit example,
such as when
I’ve followed her
to half-empty rooms across LA,
stages,
tables squished together
with mismatched chairs,
or the old theater in Venice
that used to be the courthouse
but has been
and now currently is
filled with others,
(her past and present lovers)
who too have been infected with her flu.
That’s the thing about being with a woman
who you know
has been with a few
before you,
do you forgive them
or praise her
for learning what she had to
to become as skillful as a virtuoso
handling a flute,
she knows my tune
and
when she plays it
there’s no other sound
I want to hear.
Narnia
was a children's world,
but that’s the thing about youth,
the magic
was still in the song,
and when we’re young
we’ll hum along,
but as we age
we become
afraid
to
sing.
Creation is in association
with music
and
writing is world building
with words,
but speaking to her
isn’t a necessity.
I stare back.
DO I CARE?
They say
that behind every successful man
is a woman,
and that a mistress
is one in which you have
an extramarital relationship,
and it’s her residue
that litters my apartment
with stacks of love letters in my living room,
unfinished dates and plans on my kitchen table,
and the trophies
that others have given her
on my bookshelves,
in my bathroom,
and on the nightstand by my bed.
“Can I see you tonight?”
“If you’re lucky,” she responds.