XXIII.

OK. I’ve had it up to here with Ted & Sylvia, Sylvia & Ted. Moral:

Great poetry = Nobody wins. But bloody Jesus, there’s something special

About literary couples isn’t there?—all that flesh made word, I suppose, & all

Those words made flesh (the reader’s “communion”: tasty as their flesh).

It brings out the carnivore in all of us, the sweet cannibal who’s always desired

Just the slightest taste of her thigh or his copper nipple…. All of us

Unrepentant in our delight at their demise from twinness into

A solitude as solitary as our own; & so of course it must mean that they

Were just like us all along, & after all, if only a bit more gifted in their sense

Of glamour & self-destruction (though only a little bit) & certainly far

More practical & thorough in the sexual ravaging of their friends, & if

Two can tango baby, then why not this whole goddamn room?