Blind Date

Voluptuous.
Gangly.
Husky.

Does the skin swell or does it sway?

Rippling. The fascination of its rippling.

But you can focus on the fat;
The fat is not the camel of its this --
Enclosed, entombed, and straining
At the strangling
Burden of its
Fat.

I always return to that.

These are the encasements of destiny, that hath engulfed
Many a man, by errant gene or accident or ill-considered
Choice. (We say, “There was nothing he could do.”)

And isn’t the desire, the swollen desire, maltreated
Because despised, infectious and malignant, jutting
Like an angry eye, red and ready to peak, distinct
From these constraints? It’s the metaphysics of fat.
Can the soul and the fat mix? It’s the ethics of

“No.”

Because I don’t want to be buried in it.
I would lose myself. I would be ready
To pop. It’s a matter of aesthetics -- that’s all --
No mess, no shit -- because of the disorder,
Because of the smell:

Who wants to be the one to clean that up?