no marriage this weekend. no soft quiet night, no moment to sit in a big chair and drink tea and maybe read a book or just stare out the black window at the place where the trees should be.

sex, a nostalgic gesture, like the wave you throw over your shoulder as you walk away from a place you'll never go again. the street sounds all reach the window, the coming and going of everyone else below us where we are on our soft mattress, rescued from the alley behind the market street place.

it wasn't the best decision in retrospect, but it was the only one at the time. i only regret what came after.

the only bad decisions are the older men you trust, then fear. fear them, because they are unpredictable and scared that their flesh has somehow become dirty and that maybe they will never really love again in a pure way. they take out their wallets for a good time and they reach, like children reach for apples, but lacking the innocent grace of children. old flesh, manipulated a little longer here, stringing itself up on expectations and delusion, stringing itself up just to hang there, dumb and depraved, old flesh on strings.