Love on the Streets: Selected and New Poems

How to Make Love to a Man

• 125 how to make Love to a man Run your tongue down the two tendons both sides of his neck. Run your tongue back and forth along the ridge of the underside. Run your tongue along the ridges of the head, inside his fingers, thighs, Adam’s apple, Achilles’ tendon. Wet the rigid shaft of his calf, the long hairs sticking up from his toes and the ones lying down over them like little blankets. Love his ridges, his frigid Soul. Think glacially. Constant motion, advancing slowly. Remember penis envy is what men have of each other. Remember no man can will an erection. Have him enter you awhile, the knee-chest position to dissolve the ridges. Remember he’s terrified. Remember it’s all he wants. Remember he seeks confidence you know how to handle his body, you’ll grip him firmly enough. Remember for a man the importance of technique. Remember like gripping a tennis racket. Remember he’s emotional. When he comes be careful not to tighten your grip. Be careful not to forget the battlefields he comes to you from. Forget them, the lies he must overcome to come to you. Forget that to be a “man” is to be unjust. Remember his mother removed him from their bed, deposited him on the narrow mattress with bars in the cold cell alone. Make love to all his ex-loves who live in him as surely as he makes love to yours though he seeks to banish them. Though he will say so kindly I wish you were free. He wishes to be free. Help him with trance, wear silk, light candles, wear levis and flannel, wear nothing, don’t undress. Remember just dissolve. Remember no jerky movements. Remember his greatest fear, he won’t be able to please you, he’ll lose it, let you down. Remember your walls to clasp and unclasp him. (Some will resent this, you will know who. Remember every man is different and when it becomes the dance • 126 with each’s spirit, when the river is more swift than flesh, when you break through to the place remember expose yourself. Let him see you. When he comes be careful not to change. Remember the ridges that you roamed to get here, the fall either side. Where the road began. Where you are going. When he begins to ascend toward the body cavity forming a firm rounded mass when the ocean synchronistically booms approval his edge of aggression, when you ride his aggression till you disremember everything remember this is time this is earth this is life this is you. Remember so great is his love he wants all women. ...