I was early, no thanks to the climate,
for the results of my HIV testing.
Stuck between Fifth Avenue and Broadway,
the elegant wildanimal passages
of America, boobytrapped by sleet, dragged
down by slush, I surrender to this lunar winter
and its soul-splitting icicles that mock Easterly
resurrection, the fifteenth murdering storm
since I moved here. Flanking 11th Street,
like gargoyle sentries, are Gothic cathedrals,
menacing connections to my lapsed Episcopalian
youth, the spiritual oasis for the House of Morgan
and other bulbous barons
who thieved their way through Europe, desires too large
for such stubby mortal fingers. Pushed
by the greedy storm I veer
up Broadway, mimicking the actions
of a tanned orator, lecturing
iced-over antique stores, refusing to tolerate
the sticker price for chinoiserie, Sèvres porcelain,
scorning Tiffany lamps that cost more than houses
in Akron, Ohio, home to Hart Crane and other suicides.
Everything looks tattered and lumpy,
Louis XIV sofas anchored to rare oak arms,
high society sites for fully dressed grinding. I duck
past the hacking homeless and slide
into the Strand Bookstore, registers guarded
by poster boys for this month’s disease.
I need theory: I steal
Blood of the Bastille. Two bars
and four cognacs later I enter
the doctor’s office late, a nervy night crawler
and spontaneous shopper doomed to swerve
off Broadway, walking around
with a petulant DNA pool flirting
with flights of fancy, inbred sperm
obsessed with cravings for pre-Marie France,
and before I know it I am in
the waiting room. As for the results,
pardon me, and nothing personal,
I have to first get through the Reign of Terror,
as if, anyway, it’s any of your fucking business.
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