It will always happen \u2013 the death of a friend
\nThat is the beginning of the end of everything
\nIn a large generation of sharing
\nWhat was still mistakened
\nFor the nearest middle of all things. So, by extension<\/p>\n
I am surely dead, along with David, Phil, Sam,
\nMarvin, and, surely, we all stand
\nIn a succession of etceteras
\nThat is the sentimental, inexhaustible
\nExhaustion of most men. It\u2019s like<\/p>\n
That rainy night of your twenty-eighth birthday. The exotic dancer with \u201chelicopter tits,\u201d or was So you jumped up onto the jukebox and began I walked over to you, looked up \u2013 I said that if you didn\u2019t get down
\nA strip-joint stuck in the cornfields
\nOf Coralville, Iowa.
\nBig teddybear bikers and pig farmers who were
\nNot glad to see us: my long hair,
\nYour azure, Hawaiian blouse, and David
\n_______<\/span>ordering gin \u2013 first in blank verse
\nAnd then in terza rima with an antique monocle.<\/p>\n
\nIt \u201ctits on stilts,\u201d was not coming \u2013 a flat on the interstate
\nFrom Des Moines; her breasts probably sore,
\nShe sat out the storm in the ditch
\nFeeding white mice to the boa constrictor
\nWho shared her billing.<\/p>\n
\nA flamenco dance \u2013 all the sharp serifs showing a mast,
\nAn erectness that was a happy middle finger
\nTo all those unhappy gentlemen
\nSeated there in the dark with us.<\/p>\n
\nBegged you to get down before they all
\nJust simply kicked the shit out of us. You smiled, sweetly gone.
\nThe song, I think, was called \u201cPipeline\u201d
\nAnd the platform glass on the jukebox cracked.<\/p>\n
\nI\u2019d kill you myself. You smiled again
\nWhile I aged. I said
\nThe elegy I would write for you would be riddled with clich\u00e9s!
\nYou giggled.<\/p>\n