quicksilvering@eudoramail.com 

Call Me Your Old Housefly

You sell roasting chestnuts to tourists in sequined pillbox hats
meet other old men, every day, worn but still vending
in shadows of mosque domes and minarets, joke about me
say you will take a younger wife, call me your old housefly
is this is what I have waited for all these years?

here, behind shut gates and decomposing walls, is your old housefly
more eager than any young wife could ever be, still indulging
still polishing your jeweled pistol handles and gold water pipes 

look, my wings are perfect, there is metallic green on my body
and my strings of legs can still walk about you in a slow curved dance 
like those of a bride just dismounted from camel or ox
before I become clumsy with the burden of myself
take me into your mouth, swallow me, be gorged and satiated
forage, old man, bury your face into my putrescence
my ferment and bubble 

on silk scarves I set out pistachios, apple tea, myself
am ripe for plunder, my lifelong love, drink
>from this heavy, bloated carcass, extract a precious drop
of the fecundity of me, draw it into your limp soul
stir it to life again, swallow from this heap of me

a young wife, hah! she won’t know how to dip into your body
and pull out the date pits of pain lodged in your back
her gristly thighs, clamping for a son you cannot make, will kill you
but don’t worry, you won’t die alone, her family close in
whispering how you are so old, you are already rotting in your grave

and you will be wretched, looking out of the window, waiting for me
crying out for your old wife, mother of your daughters, your love
but I will have become what you have made me, hanging from the ceiling
fast asleep, dreaming of filigreed palaces and fat painted elephants
and the fecal feast that falls for me from under their raised, quivering tails.

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