The Journalist (Exposition)

First meeting through friends removed, I stared
and tried to hear her through the roar of the bar.

But we managed to establish names and ages--
dialogue--the climax of the narrative occurring

when she lifted her black dress to show me she
had scriptor hipped, passing black lace panties....

We exchanged decreasingly casual causal glances
when lips pulled away from one another's ears.

We exchanged subtle flirtationsmiles and eyes,
uprooting my hand from my side to plant it on hers.

So we departed the bar, hopped a red train
and set off to debate ars poetica in Brooklyn.

--"So--why do you think I let you up here?"
aired from her mouth like cigarette smoke.

I sputtered "To discuss poetry?" "Maybe," coyly.
She stopped me, mounted me, and kissed me.

I kissed back, mounted her, and said with a kick
and a grin "I had hoped, but I hadn't thought."

It was nice; we sweat, spit, and our bodies came
away with blue bruises and streaking scratches.

...We smilingly whispered poetry on the floor in the
dark hours of that morning at the end of her bed.

We try to recall what we said, why we felt, how
we were, and remember only the sex and regret.