Poem for Saturday

The Valve
By David R. Slavitt

The one-way flow of time we take for granted,
but what if the valve is defective? What if the threads
on the stem wear thin, or the stuffing box or the bonnet
ring leaks, or the joints to the pipe ring fail,
and there's a backwash?
                                 It happens.
                                              And then old loves,
meeting again, have no idea what to do,
resuming or not resuming from where they were
years before. Or the dead come back to chat.
Or you are reduced for a giddy moment to childhood's
innocent incompetence. You look up
as if to see some hint in the sky's blackboard.
But then, whatever it was, some fluff or grit
that clogged the works, works free, and again time passes,
almost as before, and you try to get on with your life.


Front of the valentine my husband made me:




Anyone who lives anyplace near where The Guru is playing, GO SEE IT. ASAP. The soundtrack alone is the best thing to happen to me in weeks. Macarena, Tom Cruise "Old Time Rock and Roll" Risky Business parody and Bollywood lip-synch performance of "You're the One That I Want" from Travolta/Newton-John film version of Grease.

Like unholy merger of Chicago, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Serendipity and anonymous Indian musical romance (as soon as I do find out the title, though, I'm buying it). Oh, and gay manly men with beards, too. We saw it last night before I got this card. (He gave me K/S and I gave him K-Y. Hee!)