and to think that after
the rape the first thing i did was close the window.
behind the pane the sky ached to rain, a noticeably
bruised sort of purple overhead almost matching
the color of plum, eggplant, my that body. he ate
me, like fruit, all the same. i closed the window
and left for the light outside, leaving the house
behind, him, feeling i was a cowardly thief as over
the stone walkway i staggered, brittle, substanceless
as smoke.
and that is the one thing which had been so unbearable:
the smoke steering its own way through the apartment,
out the open window. it had been able to free itself
while i could not. at the mercy of a thief what
can one possibly do? i thought of things, i did,
though the purple laced glass i'd drank from distorted
all thinking and also the bedside light so that
in the end nothing was clear, nothing at all. certainly
not my body:
at the whims of a gone-mad Lothario. i felt nothing
but the sting of a body i felt sure was not my own,
slamming into me. i smelled nothing but the smoke.
i thought in short spurts like a power outage or
a flickering sodium vapor light. what would a passerby
think of the scene, should he happen by the window?
what would he think of this man, mad, ravaging me?
he'd certainly see the purple and almost empty glass
upon the bedside table; see shadows of movement
as the thief
stole into me, thrust after volatile thrust.
he was not a quiet sort of thief but rather moved
with the grace of a sleek animal intent on devouring
the body. (when the Greeks pillaged cities they
stole everything: emeralds, purple amethysts.
even the vanquished were theirs to plunder.) and
trails of smoke from a cigarette left burning
in the ashtray flying freely through the window
to where the night lay oblivious beyond, pooling
its own darkness into light
upon the street. had i been blindfolded i might
have envisioned such light behind closed lids,
lost in a forced blackness. as it was i merely
watched the thief perform the siege, dissociated,
a voyeur: violent shadows reflected in a pane
of window. i could not tell if his eyes were opened
or closed, if he even knew that the body beneath
him had ceased its fight, had taken refuge instead
in a silly flight of smoke. and then suddenly
it was over. a slow extraction. a pang of pain.
and this sad purple
thing lying upon the mattress, the color of rotten
fruit, so deeply purple i did not know it for
my own self as i rose and crossed the hallway.
even the light over the medicine cabinet revealed
nothing i recognized. substanceless as smoke.
and what did i think of as i cleaned the crime
off, as i listened to that bastard, that thief
move about the apartment? i thought of rot. i
thought of the Greeks and of the body perpetually
mutilated at the whims of a victor. i thought
to climb out the open window
but instead closed the window, letting the smell
of blood out to embrace whatever light the night
might harbor and took the door, a harsh purple
sky overhead as i quit that thief, ruminating
on my body, stuck there, denied escape, morphing
into a slow stack of smoke. |
