THE SEXUAL AESTHETICS

The sexual aesthetics of an unworthy species

adapting to its decline

can only be practised

by the anaesthetically blind

who can’t feel

the incisions

that open like mouths

to feed and bless and bleed

the sacrifice on the altar,

spiritually prepped for a triple bypass.

I peruse the inspired braille

of another unwritten thesis

shelved like an embryo arraigned by time,

a late fee

on the unreturnable contents of the mind,

and I can hear the mandibles of data

eating through the rafters of a great tree

that once stood like a scar

in the eye of the storm

against the wounded rage

of the gathering darkness

dementing the sky to rave for eras

against the implausible tenure of its roots;

and I see

that only coffins drop from the twisted bough

that once filled the cradles it rocked like fruit

with the light

of a thousand black mystic suns

churned into honey

in the hives of the blazing day.

Now the night that is upon us

is not darkness,

and the light

that blanches its absence away

is a vapour of lemon furniture polish

on the arms of the upturned seat

that squares the circle of the shallow grave

where it buried the audience that could not weep

for the vastly unmoved deception

that snuffed the candles it drove before it

like harried characters before the wind

until all that was left to carry the play

was the callow murmuring

of the janitorial mediocrity

changing bulbs in the footlights to the right of the stage

as if he were raping lilies.

PATRICK WHITE