Bed-Stuy, 1478
I fucked the King of France in 1478, we bumped into each other at a party last night he said, oh yes, I remember you. We held hands and climbed a ladder where we could see three things: water silos, the horizon and God. I lifted my hand from the tartack and pulled up and then we had a shower. We stood under it, washing ourselves in spittle under the moon and toweling each other’s hair with our wrung out t-shirts which smelled like other lovers. He has an incredible odor, the King said. I know, I said. I pushed my hand downward like the gravity involved in any depiction of Christ on the Cross and then we had Angolan oranges to eat. We sat on the tar, peeling away our skin while our cuticles began to sting. Your hand's on fire, he said. I put the left one in the spittle puddle while it burned out and hissed. Thank you, I said. I started to talk about the crusades, he said shush, I’m listening. Below us was a little girl pointing up and saying mama how do we get into that church.
