still, i keep secrets from you
though i tell you no lies
(well, anymore than the world…)
we all have secrets here…
the TV babbles in the next room
we watch the TV LOUD here
two on the couch..
You remember the story i told of nearly two weeks ago
in São Paulo
( alright, say the word “noun”
listen. Say the word “noun” and notice the buzzing up in your nose.
now, cut off both the Ns and say it the same
that is the sound of “ão” )
of breaking my vowes to myself.
i decided to meet up with some guy
mwa mwa mwa
and he didn’t show up
did i tell you he told me to meet him at the Sé stop down town?
it’s a metro with a very large public toilet…
that is very busy
i was angry at him
because he insisted i meet him there
and he was about an hour away
and we had talked an hour before we were to meet
i was late
but he was not there at all.
the world is whipping me into shape.
it got back to the house tonight
went to open the door
and Mario opened it for me from the inside
sitting on the couch was another man
the TV was Porn.
little banter
i know what i will do
i know both of these men as i almost know anyone
(“even you”)
the fantasy porn scene ensues on the bed
we are to meet M’s friend to have dinner with him and his lover
they call after we all wash up and L leaves
so M and i go downstairs
and who is the Lover?
but the very same one who flaked out on me
when we had talked later, after he told me he flaked on me
“family trouble”
he asked me if i would meet him again tomorrow
“not like that, no”
so here he was
and i did a VERY good job of not letting anyone know that i recognized him
i am a professional actor, you know
i have been on stages around the world
he looked like an animal caught in the headlights
we all have secrets…
i tugged his shirt and made a little “tick” noise in his ear
all very benign
but he seemed so quiet at dinner
and i kept laughing to myself
it’s fun to be a gringo
and have an excuse not to explain myself all the time
——-
many years ago…
the first time I fucked up my heart over a man sexually
he was a born again baptist
AND my teacher
i was 14 and he was 31
it was all
secrets and Lies.
but the kind of lies we tell our selves to make others believe things…
the experience left me so traumatized
that i began to obsessivly tell everyone everything
so that i would never have a secret
i often told people
that
when i came out of the closet
i blew it up.
can you tell?
i am not on the island anymore
today i am in Rio.
i am not proud of how i got here
but damnit, i am practicing my will.
i woke, bleary
João and Lua and i all chatted a bit about things
we decided we would go to the beach
rather, that is what they would do
and i was so red from the day before
i told them i would have to sit in the shade
i asked him if he would take me to a waterfall
communication had broken down so much that i would often ask him things
and he just wouldn’t respond
and his girlfriend would just speak to me in spanish (or portuguese?) without even attempting to speak english.
after breakfast, which was very nice
they went off to do things
i prepared to go
but they were still doing things
so i meditated
and they were still doing things
so i started reading the book
they were gone when the chapter was finished
never came to fetch me.
So, Ok.
I guess i Won’t be going with you to the beach today.
i flipped a coin
the coin thought i was absurd for asking it
so it landed on it’s side in the cushions of the couch
twice
but the third time
acquieced and said “GO”
so i packed my bags
wrote a note
and walked out the door.
it was a long circuitous buss ride
the world was not going to make this one easy
lack of integrity that i was displaying…
João was enamoured with his girlfriend
but he had also been extorting money out of me
or, rather, i was letting him
he was also abusing his mother’s trust in the face of me
and making many diminuitive jokes at his girlfriend’s expense
now, i have done all of these
and, in fact, felt i was doing the former at the same time
just using him
i mean, we weren’t hanging out anymore
and when we were we weren’t talking
was it because i said i didn’t like Bob Marley?
was it because i wasn’t singing the Rainbow songs along with him?
i don’t know
but it is endemic in my life
lack of graditude
and abuse
however
it is an american trait
however, it is very human
and he was doing it too
and neither of us liked the way it felt
so we withdrew into solitude
this was ugly
why perpetuate it?
but i was not in the mood to wait around for them to get back
so one bus
then the other
then the other
then at the sation in São Sebastiâo
to find that the bus to Rio de Janeiro only left at 22hrs
and cost 49,00R$
FUCK that
i caught a local buss to Caraguatuba
and then another to São José dos Campos
where one of the people i met in Abadiânia had given me a number
but i wasn’t in the mood
i wanted to be with a gay man
laying naked
NOW.
so i called Mario in Rio, he had said i could stay with him
he said SURE
and i got on the bus
to Rio.
the whole ride was prayer
listening to
Savath & Savalas
Hildegard von Bingan
and
“Jesus blood never failed me Yet” by Gavin Byars
i got to Rio
thinking i was an hour late
but i wasn’t.
i was right on time.
and Mario was there with a friend to pick me up
(the same friend, yes)
Mario felt good to touch
that smooth dark dissipating warmth
Yin?
he looks like a monkey
it is all about animals
i gave him a bit of a massage
and we cuddled to sleep together
then…
in the morning
it was more playing around
tangling sheets
and then he was off to work
i got on the computer to get my fix…
emails and bear sites and chatter
i decided not to go out til after the strongest heat of the sun…
15hrs would be OK
and made a plan to meet a nice boy i had been talking with on line
who made lots of references to Stephen Sondheim and looked sexy in the way i liked
in my obsessive way
i was late
he was not there
but that is because
we ” were not good with the plans because no one could have planned it like that
(the same, you might say, is true of history)” [steven jesse bernstein]
lost from eachother for at least an hour
probably more
we both got a bit burned by the sun
and i ate a green coconut
the men here cut them with such expertese it approaches miraculous tedium
people selling, or trying to, everything
trays of shrip… raw? on skewers…
thick british boys…
a million tourists…
Gringos…
i am staying just a block from Copacabana beach
i walked on the beach to the far end..
watching all the people playing volleyball
laying crowded together
– i often notice that
no matter how attractive a man is
i don’t find anyone sexy in huge crowds like this
(but for maybe in a situation like NYC where everywhere is always crowded all the time to such a degree that no matter where you are or what you are doing you are ALONE and if you ever notice anyone else and pay them any attention what-so-ever
they are alone with you in that same little bubble…)
i walked towards Impanema
trying to call Osmar on his cell phone
but no good…
well, i found him eventually
and we walked back towards eachother
on that walk
instilled with some sort of silly pride
i caught the eyes of many men
one was sitting with a woman
but his look was so open and friendly
it brought warmth up my spine
and a huge grin on my face i could do nothing but wear
i turned back to see him a few times
laughing to myself
and just a few meters later
passed on the same feeling, i am sure, to a rather corpulent fellow sitting with his little friend
*BLUSH*
Osmar is such a sweet boy
a little bit taller than me
and about four times as large
with the voice of a velvetine rabbit
we walked back towards Impanema
and climed some rocks at a place known as
Arpoadar
he explained to me that, over there, people fuck in the bushes at night…
we were honest with eachother as old friends are
(everyone and i are old friends)
we talked about our parents
the obvious traights of Gemini’s with their sun’s in the Sagitarius house
the obvious traights of people with Saggitarius rising
the comfortable and cuddly touch of a father
being uncomfortable because you cannot touch his cock
cigarettes
pictures
sunsets
my god
it is beautiful here
but my belly was rumbling
and now i think it was just intuition telling me to fucking MOVE
but at the time i thought it was hunger or sickness
we left and started walking
walking walking walking
he decided he was going to show me the gay section on the Impenema beach
and then take me to a gay place to get some food in the gay area of town
(though not so gay, really)
walking on the sidewalk
beautiful setting sun
smatterings of rain
a beautiful muscular pepper-haired man walks past me and we lock eyes in a comfortable but intense way
i turn my head to glance at him and he at me
and i stop in my tracks and shift my weight backwards
and approach him
“oh my god, Ed, what are you doing here?”
last year..
NO
Two years ago
in london
just before i left
when i had all of my energy being drained
i met him in a bar
but was possessed
so could only have simple interractions
though the attraction was strong
from both of us
and in a unique way
i am not really generally into muscle daddies
and he is not generally into hippies
(and their of us are those)
but there was something
when i found myself marooned back in the USA
we wrote emails to eachother expressing our desires
in vague/specific terms
*have you ever been in love with me?*
he had just arrived a few days ago with a brazilian friend of his from London
they are not a couple, but are together while he is here
now he is possessed, in that temporary way
and we were both buzzing all over at eachother
our hug was long and deep
and we left plans open as to when we would see eachother again
the whole weight of my not returning to europe last year fell on me with a THUD
and dragged me down in the mud
“well, i’m sorry that i cannot get to you
stuck in my 50 pound lead boots
stuck in my Deep Sea Diving suit” (stephen merrit)
now my stomach hurt more fiercely
but this time it was definately ill
and i wanted to eat nothing
moments later
while Osmar and i were talking
and singing to eachother
i imagined us as perfect lovers
and how i would live with him so long
and this boy would have restored my zest and pleasure in life…
As we sat on the rocks at Arpaudor
i stared at his dark skin
dark hair
everywhere
thick thick hands
with too many picean lines to be a sagitarius’s hands
feeling their meaty weight
listening to his child-like voice
with too much understanding and depth than what he wished
he said ” i am very vein ” sitting there like that
a simple prop
a little lie to try and distract from the heart and soul of the matter
i told him he was not a Bear, but a Gorrilla
and how the only other Gorrilla i have loved was a Robert in the south…
who also was made of a different PH balance than i
i notice Osmar’s glasses being eaten away by his sweat
just like the other gorrillas’ had…
m
m
m
back on the street
i was humming Tori’s “cruicify” to myself over and over
with the occasional bursting out of morrissey songs
he took me to the most perfect healthfood store
i love Rio.
it is like NYC but on the beach.
with cleaner air
and oodles of danger
the favelas lining the hills
so beautiful and deadly
but a testament to anarchy
freedom
and a type of honesty that is rare
Osmar and i walked quite a while
i wanted to see the city
which was so much more together than São Paulo
who was a city who looked like it had once been glorius and was now just in 3rd world ruin
Rio looks like any modern city in Europe or USA
but with some class, asthetic
and… Brazil.
when i got back to the apartment…
When L had left and M was showing me picture of the men he had comming to stay
the first one, to arrive in a few days, is from london
a man that i had met at the end of 2002 in Cologne at the bear gathering there
who i had had very strong honest clear sex with in the sauna
maybe i will be sticking around here for a while
it feels very good to me
and
obviously
i am in the right place
as life is comming at me from all sides
see You soon.
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