This is a tough one for me, in fact I dislike most of it. The background is the D.A.B.Sci. course I was doing at the same time as the M.A. We were always trying to get in touch with our feminine side, except for the women, of course. Any hint of sexist attitudes was jumped on from a great height, particularly by the men, once they'd learnt the vocabulary. I managed okay because I'd been exposed to feminism for years thanks to Elizabeth and her cronies, but I was suspect because of my attitude. I liked women and liked them to be women, I tried to be gallant and charming. Also I was going out with the most beautiful woman on the course, Eva.

It is a sort of ambivalent tirade against almost every attitude to male sexuality I could think of. Its barely coherent. I did perform it several times to mixed reactions, and noted that people often reacted to what they thought I said assuming I was agreeing with their own ideas. It all seems so self righteous and terribly old fashioned, now.

BACK

Performance piece II

Outside, for a moment,
By a corner, near a light,
Not quite in shadow,
But not in the glare,
I saw him,
Some man full of cock and promises ...... stare.

Leaning like a loose tooth
With his own delicious pain,
And the strain of a certain hand span length
Of private flesh
Where his nerve end were.

Whatever he whispered,
From his out of focus face,
Some place we met, or agreed to meet,
Was lost in the space between us,
In the fleet, black line of light moving,
As it lingered on nothing,
Rocked like a wave,
Like a beckoning hand or a warning,
Or a hook from a dealer in slaves.

I stood in my deeper darkness,
Lank, lost, comeing or leaving,
Both were the same,
With a hole somewhere inside,
Between my balls and my brain,
Some drain for desire and passion,
And nothing to plug it but blame.
The moment between me and my mirror,
One well hung and the other insane,
Was taken as test or treasure,
It didn't matter ....................
It wasn't some slim piece of flesh
Between my cheeks
That was offered or desired,
And the disdain in his smile
Didn't cry for control,
He stood like some whole man,
Simple and cock-sure,
With a pure strength and purpose
That left me in my sensitivity,
My flayed areas,
Pinned, sexless and polotic,
On a see-saw between friend and lover,
Of the other,
Not sister or mother,
The she that tells me, now,
She wants a man outside all conspiracy
To pin her down,
Some new man.
So as I sit, or give my seat,
As I buy, or not buy drinks,
As I lie at night,
Not wanting, and not wanting wanting,
Caught like a fly .....
Bitter and guilty,
Caught like a worm ....
Pale and flaccid,
Watching myself for signs of connection ......

How do we solve a problem like Maria ?

Its going, lads ....
With your dicks held like twelve inch rules
In your hands,
Feeling the loss
When you reach for something else ....
Wanking into the sky
With space fucks ......
Sending only sterile seed through the five-barred gate
Of the nothing outside the limb of gristle
Tight against your thigh ......
Its going lads
In your pinhead pinstripes, smart footwear,
Or the ragbag of, with luck,
Your fornicating youth.
You have no oats, only promises ....
So leave it out
And let's all have a look,
Let's see whose pink little thing
Perks up at the tight round arse
Of the tart who'd do it for peanuts,
Or a couple of drinks ......
Whos bone sticks out
For the boys with cunts,
Slim hipped and sliding in their seats,
Ready for action and a roll in the hay .....
What quiverings, ignored or encouraged,
Happen when your friend drops his hat
And you see your curved reflection
In his polished arse ......

Come on .....
We all know now, the secrets out,
Our dicks are in our brains,
We talk with our mouths full of balls.
Our tongues shoot, spurt,
Throw their spume into the air .....
Into the shell like
Cunt like
Folded ears of the ladies who listen.
But they're not now, are they? eh?
Its not just the slags anymore, who talk and talk
Till you fill their mouths with meat,
One way or another.
Its not just your mother who chirps and whines,
Trying to get through
What you think she should do
To fulfill her obligations to you,
And send a clean, well fed, well hung man
Into the world.

Its not just the dykes
And old maids with crimping shears
After your balls .........
All the women want what we've walled up,
With penises and promises,
While we protect them
From the world,
And shackle them
With our careless discharges ......
Now they all want what we're supposed to have,
The keys, the tools, the power and the time,
The lot.
If not that, then half of it.
But who are we going to be
In that new world?
What will we give,
And what weight will be lifted and shared?
Or is the last beast<
The last ogre and dragon
We're sent out to kill ...... ourselves.

A dilemma holds us now,
The definitions and the who's who
Of sex and roles.
Not gender but energy, now,
Is talked about and round,
Is active or passive, changes, ying and yang,
And the man, in myth or reality,
The wham-bam-thank-you-mam man,
Is told to change,
Has now to vibrate his wrist and hips,
Endlessly .....
Has to endure,
Or love,
The hard repetition
Necessary, now, for the others pleasure .....
Where foreplay used to be his achievements,
Or money as metaphor,
Or respect,
His game of courting,
His art,
Now it seems,
The nearer to perpetual motion he can come,
She can come.

And, for him, he finds all his strength
Taken as a matter of intercourse,
With any leak into the world,
Of preoccupation or occupation,
Seen as a perpetration of some order
That shackles her creativity, joy and orgasm.
Yes I want a change,
But romance too.
I want the start of something new,
With women who can be girls,
Who can be objects for themselves,
Through me,
Like me through them,
And some simple sharing,
Not equal, but enough for each.

And somewhere
Is the chameleon for my mood,
Is the rude and ladylike presence,
Is some last, lost corner
Beside responsibility,
Where sense is not so much important,
And the love expressed in hand on breast,
Is more than all the strivings for control.

Yes, I have knelt at the gates of heaven,
Humble and proud,
The bedclothes round my shoulders like a shroud,
With my tongue full of prayer,
The duty and the treasure locked together,
As my lips pay service in erotic piety,
And your fingers knot my hair.

Your kissed clitoris,
LIke lapping at the moon,
( And my hot-shot prick not coming between us,
But still coming all too soon )
Becomes the private, intimate, infinite place,
A spot in space for my tongue-tips' touch,
Or the mad dog that licks at your womb.

My hands cruise your body, an unseen land,
Like the shadow of clouds,
Finding folds and tremors, feeling terrible quakes,
And the time that it takes to taste into you,
Ages, to make and level mountains.
Your thighs thrash and crash about my ears.

There's a deep spring in your dark cave,
And a polished pearl throbs at the heart of you,
The entrance, keystone in your arch,
And I whisper words of magic, breathe soft breaths,
And take the pearl in my mouth,
To mingle with the wine of you.

Your sacrament of flesh
Gives grace to both of us,
And the communion before the communion,
Prepares me and commands you
To receive this supplicant.
And as I rise, like a wet sun,
Towards your face,
My prick in its proper place,
I know I love and am loved,
By the whole of you.