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Opening Paths I am indifferent again, I am obsessed by indifference. Worried by it. Why indifference after I have discharged my stream of love. There you are, breasts, buttocks and belly lying beside me and I converse with you on Dostoyevsky,Tolstoy,excitedly,intelligently? Youlisten, absorbed, your eyes wander over my face with detachment. You too have discharged your love and can think and seeclearly again. Are we in love? We are in conversation, we have enjoyed our sex. As I talk, I look at your body and do not necessarily need to possess it. Look at your face, it is lived. Age is beginning to tell. Youlook at my face, age is beginning to tell: lines, jowls. We are middle-aged lovers who can discuss after a grand orgasm together that was the body at work and now the mind, the self-regard which the mind stands for comes into play. Our common interests must be stated, we must find another way of communicating fully besides through body, and we do it with the mind. We search for the fullness of communication and understanding between us. We are wary, unsure, eager to do well, uncertain of each other's mind and knowledge. We will go on to discover everything that can keep us together. We talk, stumble upon the wrong phrase, correct ourselves, wait diffidently for the other to speak, react excitedly in response to convey interest, identify with agreement or a loving disagreement that will stimulate us to speak even more rapidly and concretely. We are opening paths to each other. This is so much more difficult than love and we are trying. See It's not you in particular, not your hair, nor breasts, nor belly, thigh, voice, and subtly inviting movements. It is not my asking and not your reply and not my excitement nor yours—this movement together of nearly unendurable pleasure. See from our bed, now that we recline and rest, 766 I Poems of the 1990s ...

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