Judith E. Johnson

NIGHTPIECE

not to touch, she said to me, anything sticky

oil hairgoo pitgooch rancid facecream spoit

vegetables, overripe, and stepped down around

the dried crud at the curb, shaking flaked soot from her hair

any kind of filth that could rub off on me, not

to feel, she begged me, wash swallow and swirl of just any

old slime sloshing, and the little white scaly seeds

Scattered the riding winds of a city’s dandruff

not to break down inside me, she promised, the barrier

that keeps what i use from touching what I am, and took

one giant step over the rainbow rings on the black

skin of an oil pool, not not not to absorb

in my veins the jackhammer jolt

of what i despise, and tripped delicately past

the red splat of pizza, waded the tiny pink

bobbing faces trapped in the vomit marsh

on the IND stairs, raking

her dress form her thighs with the fingers of their smell,

walked through the glass showcase

stares of "queers" in the mirror doors sweetheart when you sat

right through the ticketed marked-down sale

merchandise that would have raped her if she had looked

one come-on and jerking his head, with an ingratiating smile comb

the meat from your bones in strings and right on through

all the people that might rub off, the blood lymph mucous that bubbles

over the line between it and you inside you, doesn’t know when

to stop pretty

Copyright 1969 by Judith Johnson Sherwin, 1996 by Judith E. Johnson

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