Because life’s too short to blush,
I keep my blood tucked in.
I won’t be mortified
by what I drive or the flaccid
vivacity of my last dinner party.
I take my cue from statues posing only
in their shoulder pads of snow: all January
you can see them working on their granite tans.
That I woke at an ungainly hour,
stripped of the merchandise that clothed me,
distilled to pure suchness,
means not enough to anyone for me
to confess. I do not suffer
from the excess of taste
that spells embarrassment:
mothers who find their kids unseemly
in their condom earrings,
girls cringing to think
they could be frumpish as their mothers.
Though the late nonerotic Elvis
in his studded gut of jumpsuit
made everybody squeamish, I admit.
Rule one: the King must not elicit pity.
Was the audience afraid of being tainted
–this might rub off on me–
or were they–surrendering–
what a femme word–feeling
solicitous–glimpsing their fragility
in his reversible purples
and unwholesome goldish chains?
At least embarrassment is not an imitation.
It’s intimacy for beginners,
the orgasm no one cares to fake.
I almost admire it. I almost wrote despise.
Copyright ©:
Alice Fulton

A few random poems:
- Heaven–Haven: A Nun Takes The Veil poem – Gerard Manley Hopkins poems
- Robert Burns: Willie Brew’d A Peck O’ Maut:
- “My northern blood exults to face” poem – Alfred Austin
- The Ring of Stars by Robert Desnos
- Михаил Кузмин – Запел петух, таинственный предвестник
- Олег Бундур – Копуша
- Василий Жуковский – Светлане
- Эмиль Верхарн – Зимняя пора
- A Ballad That We Do Not Perish poem – Zbigniew Herbert poems | Poetry Monster
- My Butterfly by Robert Frost
- The Defunct Drugstore by Robert Lloyd Jaffe
- A Three-Part Song by Rudyard Kipling
- Youth
- Николай Гербель – В дорогу
- Олег Бундур – Однажды на даче
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- Italy poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- Inspiration poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- In Uncertainty To A Lady poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- Doors Of The Temple poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- Darkness poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- Crapulous Impression poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- Complaint Of A Poet Manqué poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- By The Fire poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- Books And Thoughts poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- Anniversaries poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- A Melody By Scarlatti poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- A Little Memory poem – Aldous Huxley poems | Poetry Monster
- September
- Scenes Of The Mind
- Revelation
- Return From Business
- Private Property
- Points And Lines
- Poem
- Panic
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works