I think because I'm feeling like we need something
on a lighter note before I read the last poem--
and I just lost the page so bear with me--
I'll read "Posteriors for Posterity."
And that poem is one of those poems that
made its own way in the world.
My best friend and I, when we were in our early 30s--
and there's a friend in the back row
who knows this other friend.
Magda Reyna just amazed me when she came up to me.
We haven't seen each other probably
in 30 years since our sons were in grammar school together.
[COUGHING]
My girlfriend and I decided that we were looking so hunky
that we needed to document this, so my husband graciously
agreed to photograph us from the back in the nude.
And we did this for two years in a row,
but then the third year came around
and we hadn't been going to the Golds as much,
and age does do something with sagging and whatever.
So I thought that's what the poem was going
to be about, but in the way that writing takes on its own life,
so did this poem.
"Posteriors for Posterity.
How to talk politely in mixed company about the behind,
the backside part of the front you can see,
the backdrop hidden from your view
except for those treacherous times when you lean way over
then back over your shoulders, full light
against the dark and a mirror catches your flanks.
Imagine strolling down the street self-conscious, so
conscious of your jeans too tight across your butt,
clutching the curve below the rise, dipping just enough,
those matched rounded onions unless you're
one of those flat wonders of whom others mutter pero ni
quiere nalgas as if life's success revolves
around a fat, not flat, ass.
Then you shake by in a sultry mode,
and someone shouts mueve la cintura.
And it's not your waist they desire but those sweet notes
side by side, crooning as they dispense papal blessings.
Then I tell you, that's some ass that man has,
a nice juicy butt."
[LAUGHTER]