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75 exile – 1991 he secures the needle, sinks it deeper in the IV swings— a clothes line— a strong wind on the cracked vinyl stool, he steadies himself against the metal pole checks ids & clicks. silverlake’s sleaziest sex club—the exile a cautionary totem to randy patrons, he is exile’s idea of safer sex education. why sink good money on pamphlets & posters? clicks three queens in. sex club regulars. what swings ya out this way? he asks.steady the moon hangs, a bruised pearly orb, wind warm, summer santa anas, wind troubling his toxo drip. i drove out to the exile broke & lonely, to keep him company. keep him steady through the long night. he has to work. sinks every penny he earns on meds & bills. the door swings open, an old queen walks out, eyes to the ground. click another one vanishes into the night. clicks endless scour for flesh. techno floats out, mingles with the wind he jumps off his stool. swings & jitterbugs with his i.v. pole to thumpthumpthump. pariah, this exile invites me to join him, orders me to wipe that hopeless sinking look off my face & DANCE! he stumbles i rush to steady 76 him. he pushes me off & sits back down, steadies his breathing. a queue is forming & he resumes click clicks. let me dance! if i fall,let me. sinking me with a withering look. he’s shrunken so. the wind could easily take him high & away from this earthly exile. let this bug-disease-death-thing swing the way its gonna swing. nothing to say. steady my composure. ashamed of defining him . . . victim. exile i stare at the space between the stars. he clicks the queens in. his hair, cancer thin & translucent, sways in the wind moon grass thumpthumpthumpdrip into the needle sinks the needle deeper he steadies himself but the santa anas swing him up & high in mid-click a fierce wind exile. ...

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