Bare skin is my wrinkled sack,
when hot Apollo pumps my back.
When Jack Frost grabs
me in these rags,
I wrap my legs with burlap bags.
My flesh is cinder, my face is snow,
I walk the railroad to and fro.
When city streets are black and dead,
the railroad embankment is my bed.
I sup my soup from old tin cans,
And take my sweets from little hands.
In Tiger Alley, near the jail,
I steal away from the garbage pail.
In darkest night,
where none can see down
In the bowels of the factory,
I sneak barefoot upon stone
Come and hear the old man groan
I hide and wait like a naked child
Un der the bridge my
heart goes wild
I scream at a fire on the riverbank
I give my body to an old gas tank
I dream that I have burning hair,
boiled arms that claw the air,
the torso of an iron king,
and on my back a broken wing,
who'll go out whoring into the
night on the eyeless road
in the skinny moonlight.
Nay, nor dowd, or athlete proud,
nay, wanton with me in the shroud.
Oh, come lie down in the dark with me,
belly to belly and knee to knee.
Oh, look into my wooded eye.
Oh, lie down under my darkened
thigh.
You