Positively Poetry

Sonnet 16 Smooth

When I used to jog along Lake Michigan
black girls would giggle and whistle with glee
they loved my furry legs; I would smile
as I sprinted past them mindful of the remaining mile.

Men used to love my legs and behind
so hairy, golden brown and virile
I loved to show them off clad
only in a small bikini on the beach.

Twelve months on indinavir
I am losing my fur
my legs have a little hair left
my butt, totally smooth.

Caressing, massaging my body from head to toe, I love your smooth ass, he says Jolted from the pleasurable sensations, I look over wondering who he is talking to.

--Vimal K. Jairath

---

pity those

pity the bodies that embrace

hatred

etched, carved

in the weary lines of the worn, torn face

pity the miserable, wretched

being

forever looking

but never seeing . . .

--n.y. robin

---

June and August 1996

Rainbow banners arc Fifth Avenue.
On airwaves, on messy newsprint,

Light wind directs drizzle to the Pride Parade.
the hype this month is: Life on the Planet Mars.

At 2 p.m. hundreds of thousands stop.
Saturn still holds my interest,

A cop lowers her radio, drowning static; a queen
with rings of ice cold ash, blue boulder

gathers his hem, stopping the tinkling of bells.
bodies of water long ground to bits.

We hold our dead around us in silence.
Saturn cant let them go and vice versa,

With a cheer the procession continues.
small things spun in the gravity of something bigger.

--Steven Cordova

---

Hieroglyph

I wouldn't have had it any other way than just as soon as

I promise not to write another lousy word about

decay or loss and vow to answer every how

are you with a generous fine thanks

I'm shown my baby brother's

short story about his

dying "uncle"

help me Rhonda help help me Rhonda

my sister hugs me

with an anacondan grip

and says how great I look and

mom insists my hair is getting thicker

to which I say and mean it wow and I love

you and thanks and so do you and no it's not a

perm and life is good and well I really can't complain

-- Ron Drummond

---

Your Look-Alike on The 6

Doors close on the Pelham local.
You brush against my shoulder, grip
the straphanger. It's been two years, Patrick.

But his hair isn't red (rather sandy).
Through round wire rims he reads
Anna Karenina; you never would.

A red/blue edged air mail envelope,
with a foreign stamp, European
handwriting, serves as his bookmark.

What a noggin' its oblong shape,
like yours, in a shaved state --
especially that knob in the back.

With a smile, his wiry form gets off
at Bleecker, a stride surer than yours.
It'd be nicer if he got off at Spring.

-- Jon Nalley