Gods in Suburbia: Aphrodite

I.

Having been held under for so long, she emerges.

Her beauty urgent, shameless.

Sparkling eyes like the glistening gold dripping from her earlobes.

She meets and holds a man’s gaze until he turns away.

The room is dark and warm and lusty,

the underbelly of some sweating beast,

heaving and sweltering,

the steady bass its heart’s rhythmic pounding.

Words come easily.

A glass of wine and a black dress.

Crowded.

Feeling his closeness—

his lips at her ear, fingertips tracing her backbone,

thighs pushing in, muscles moving and tightening beneath the collar.

So close. A tingling, a letting go, an anticipation.

Searching, longing, desiring—

seduced by sound and skin, filled with need.

Glancing eyes, nervous laughter,

limbs that cannot stop twitching.

In the dim light, drawn to her,

fingers slim and inviting,

a neckline begging for affection,

a shoulder bare and brown,

captivated by form and shape,

enchanted by color, sliced by the warm, murky nectar of her voice

Again and again, reaching for perfection.

A senseless desire propels them,

all else a distraction—

ambition, career, commitments, tomorrow.

No, just this.

All she wants – the sole thing – is to have him in her mouth.

To touch. To taste. To hear the sounds.

Oh, the body.

So she arrives

and will not be ignored. II. Aphrodite, repressed, approaches middle age

Where there would have been love

there is just absence

nothing but a ravine of yearning

cleaved by a stream of sorrow

slick stones, pebbles of bitterness, tears of flame

the only passion is in the mind

skin is the vessel through which love congeals

peaks, becomes palpable

the storm cloud darkens and aches to release its sobs

it remains untouched, my tender wound, untended

no man has awakened it from my mouth

pulled it from my tongue

searched for it in the irises of my eyes

touched me in that place, velvet and wet

my blood is made of sugar and fire

brewed to sweeten, sting his senses, burn his lips

but untasted it remains

I am a lute un-played

a song unheard

a pyre unlit

I have crossed the threshold

begun my decline

a blossom browning, curling at its edges

its scent mawkishly, nearing decay

grasping desperately for any passing bee or butterfly, indiscriminate

I have left only my lament

a melancholy, clichéd refrain

before me a girl dances at the seashore

she contains, in her lanky limbs and fresh face

and in her yet uninhabited, taut abdomen

a magnetic stone that men desire to unearth

a nectar they dream of sucking from her

a tide pulling them into her sea

just by existing, she is wanted, coveted

just by standing still, like the moon—blank and mute

but now

something is lost

that magic that men crave

as you age it withers, diminishes, wears thin

as the voice, which cannot hide its years

at first pure honey

then it wobbles, cracks at its edges, desiccates

as the hands crease and crinkle

collect brown freckles, swollen blood vessels

we can no longer hide our age with cloth, with jewels, with paint

Love, it’s an addiction

would a quarry full of nights of passion have satisfied the longing,

or would we always thirst for more?

Love, its nature is unquenchable

its nature is novelty

a ravenous beast

that desires sacrifice after sacrifice

of skin, of eyes, of sweat and flesh

sadistic, it wants to hear the groans of men

a greedy fisherman, a voracious hound

its appetite incapable of satisfaction

At the crossroads—

we have always lived for love, or its hope,

always on the path of its discovery

restless mariners

now we must find another reason to exist

don’t hold onto the past that has slipped away

the memory of our young face

there can only be pain and regret

don’t look expectantly for that thirsty gaze of men

it exists no longer

we must turn elsewhere

Our faces broaden with middle age, thicken,

we become more of who we are,

a more concentrated version of ourselves.

In old age, the face and body sag, dragged downward,

anticipating our fast-approaching journey to the soil, to the seas.

Become what you are, what you are meant to be.

Then let it go.

This can be cruelty or relief depending on the color of your mind.

No, there must be a new beginning,

a transformation

beyond vanity, beyond body

an admiration of the beauty of my own soul

buried deeply in my form

an essence of spirit

leaning closer to God

shimmering on the inside

with his ecstasy.