I like Haring best when he’s raw,
so large the image might smear,
so thick on the page I could
tear off my underwear.
When I was a kid, I hated the word
“pleasure.” It made me feel like
my parents knew my penis got stiff
in the tub, that the washcloth
felt good on the tip. Imagine our veins:
graffitied tunnels desire moves through,
brakeless rumbling into thrust.
Just relax, the man said, as he opened
my legs, fingers slick with his own wet.
His tongue in my ass unlocked
a place in my chest I was afraid of.
A friend told me he thought the great revelation
of his life would be a phrase from Keats
or Yeats, not a married man at his throat:
I want to fuck your boy-pussy.
He said he never felt closer to god.
Cartoon hard-ons, dicks with faces, mouths
stuffed with cock. Nameless fucking
self-loathing finally brought me to.
I’m so glad to have a body I hated.