WEBVTT

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"Control."

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"In the Pornhub video,
"Two Houseless Men

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Suck Each Other on a Subway
Bench," it's late at night,

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but not late enough
no one is around.

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The people are outraged,
call the men disgusting,

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New York and humans disgusting,
while they continue to record.

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I have the space
inside my body to feel

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the two men, their commitment to
pleasure absent basic comfort.

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The one's face nearly neutral,
as though his friend's mouth

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and the sting of existence
canceled each other out,

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almost like a
mannequin, just there.

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On Hyde Street,
yesterday morning,

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walking briskly in
no clear direction,

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I saw a man on the opposite
sidewalk, a motorcycle parked

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at a right angle to his feet.

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He put one hand on a handle,
the other on his crotch,

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and glared above the slow
moving traffic, at me.

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The question in his
face, it's own answer.

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When I tell you I don't know
what to do with my life,

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I mean I don't know
how to stay inside it.

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Joy, Gary says, is a feeling
of profound gratitude.

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And before I can ask for what,
for having come how far I have

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come, I celebrate my
friend and think at once,

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we should be grateful
then for surviving

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a country that makes of survival
a victory and not a right.

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We talk about our boyfriends,
syntax, Nella Larsen's passing.

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Gary leans across the
couch to touch my chin.

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We were lovers once, briefly.

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I look at him look at me.

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Try to love yourself,
darling, he says.

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You're going to be
here a long time.

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