Anita Poem by David McLansky

Old girl young girl
My well scrubbed cherub's face
The morning lines of pillow creases
Are on your face
And the wire hair marks of middle age
Rise up with your head
In dumb oblivion
And you're not wearing hair curlers

Old girl you're getting older
And each year your seductive glance
Must become more obvious
To light the interest of the beery-eyed
How long will your bosom swell thoughts of fondling?
But with my head lying next to yours
These things are not said
So I smile and kiss you sweetly
And leave it all to history

Old girl you're getting older
So when are you going to start life
Why all this play
These shifting night-life scenes
These ploys of jealousy and desperate laughter
Bosomy sensuality
Eternal retreating
Double entendres
And in the morning
These jokes about being strangers
When we really wake up
Warm with memories of one another

It's crazy
It's frightening
It scares me
Milk mother maiden and bar stool habitue

Telephone operators
Repairmen
Employers
Checkout counter
Boys and girls
You put out for them
Seducing a laugh
To feed the lie that there is
Universal love in this jungle
Of bored and sadistic housekeepers
And lonely sick killers
On the cobbled stone streets of Greenwich Village
Day and night