Date
Some people lose things in the war, he said. Legs, arms, eyes, ears, scalps, nipples, cocks, balls. I didn’t, he said. Was this boasting? He moved the saltshaker back and forth, but not in a way that suggested mental instability but perhaps boredom. The food arrived and he dissected the steak. I didn’t lose anything, he said. Is that right, I said. That’s right. I gained something, he said. I gained the power of the American army. I have the American army in my belt. My eyes, too. Look into my eyes, he said. I did. My eyes are made from artillery lenses from China, he said. Every night I dream that I’m in a plane, fighting clouds. He didn’t say anything else for the rest of the meal, though was it really a meal or just two people sharing a table to eat a cow at.
Amalgam
The great unwashed
of Baltimore
aboard coffin ships
Don DeLillo
Sex with him
Wasn’t sex
But a series of contests
Can your vagina
fit these
12 frankfurters in it
can your penis
fuck every hole
in the city
They said to each other
They measured hand spans
Foot size
Height and so on
Hours passed and
He asked again
Can your anus recite Shelley
Can your penis
dip itself in ink
and write William Styron novels
They slept back to back
Even their spines
Were comparing each other
In sleep