hotel amour

 
I watched her from my dimly lit table in a classy gin joint,
as Bogart used to call it. she sat at the bar with her legs crossed.
occasionally she’d rub her calves together, raising one knee a
little too high. it made the hem of her dress ride up obscenely, &
the men observed it as if they were stalking a tainted secret.

she studied hard all her life to be exactly what she desired  –  a
bad girl. her body was a danger that could take a man to a place
that was uncharted on the itineraries of most women.

finally, a joker took the bait & asked if she wanted a drink.
‘depends if you can afford it,’ she said, regarding his unspoken
intent in the back bar mirror. he knew right away she wasn’t
referring to a cocktail.

they’d finalize the details & head for a hotel room upstairs, the
secluded chamber of a sordid affair. after some fancy moves on the
bedsheets, he’d leave to rush home to a wife, maybe, & plot his lies
on the way. she’d walk out baby-powder fresh, cradling a stoic
Benjamin in her purse.

she’d purchase two drinks at the bar & come to my table. I’d ask if
she got her dirty thrill from the latest one-shot lover, but she wouldn’t
talk about it. not to me.

I spent nights with her, away from the profession. mostly we’d sit
close together, on the back porch in summer, reading anthologies
of verse. ‘Good Poems,’ rounded up by Garrison Keillor. like that.

when she got sleepy, she’d fold herself up tiny to fit in my arms, & we’d
drift into an illegitimate reverie: dreams of romance we could only steal.

I figure I’m only someone for her to be lonely with, but she tells me she
needs our intimacy. she just needs it.

so we sat & drank,
two outlaws on a slow ride to nowhere  –
(and who will love us when we get there…)


(Art: Max Dupain)