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Remember when you got ahold of that book in ‘36? The censored one, the one they put on an obscenity trial.
Ulysses , yeah. Joyce or whoever, that crazy Irish bastard. Couldn’t understand half of it, it was so thick. I gave up reading it before I got to the part with the sex, which is why I really wanted to read it.
Well you know it is, Steve.
I could barely make it through a newspaper back then. Guess I’m better now. Reading up on you made me learn. But even if I’d been literate then I still would have wanted to hear that book told in your voice. Back then you got all raspy from coughing and yelling and fighting, but when you read you kinda soften. Voice was smooth like your fingers running through my hair.
I laid down, didn’t I? Head in your lap while you read. Those long fingers of yours combing knots out of my hair.
Were we on the fire escape like this? Yeah, probably. We were always on the fire escape, listening in on our neighbors. Listening for our pal Gene from the bar calling up to us from the street. I wish I remembered him better. Him and those ladies’ fur coats. All that rouge, too. I used to buy it for both of you and say it was for my girls, remember?
They didn’t talk about all that at the Smithsonian, did they? Didn't say a damn thing about all the fairies we hung out with. Nothing about you being a punk. They don’t get why I say it, and I’m not gonna correct them unless you do. But you were. Are, still--I know you’re calling it bi now, and queer. Queer’s more familiar. But I’ll call you whatever you want. You know that, right? Pretty Stevie.
Yeah, I know you like that. Get all red across your cheeks and on the back of your neck like you’ve been out painting murals too long. Or fighting, I guess. Would rather you were painting, getting colors streaked across your skin when you wipe your face. I know this is what you wanted, but just watching you carry that shield makes me tired. Wish you’d set it down awhile.
Come lie down with me, Stevie. Let me lay on your lap while you read. I don’t care what it is you read--well, maybe not the news. The news is always too much, especially when they say your name. Anything else, though, read anything to me while you stroke my hair like a cat, and I’ll listen. Let me turn my head against your stomach and feel the rise of your breath. Let me nuzzle close to the soft and secret places of you while cars creep by ten storeys below. Let your beautiful voice curl into my ears reading ‘yes I said yes I will Yes.’