I should like you to take off your clothes
So that I write of your nakedness.
I should like you to disrobe in front of me,
To slowly divest yourself of your vestments.
I should like to write of how you unclasp the clasp
That hold your hair and to watch it fall, uncoil,
And nestle on a shoulder not yet bare.
I should like to watch you unslip your feet from within their
Encasement of shoes which prevent me from seeing your toes
And the full sense of the sharp yet gentle curve of the lateral
Malleolus as it blends into the talus, that upper part of the foot
Which holds us in our shoes, which provides us with the arch.
Oh, yes, I want to see you arch your feet, left, then right.
To write of how you rotate them, each in turn. Wow.
And sitting or standing, I should like to write of how you raise
Your arms, each in turn pulling up, sleeve on sleeve, the jersey which
Has hugged your upper body. I would like to catch with my pen
Those movements as you pull the neck of your sweater over your head,
Momentarily blinded to the world. And pause as you free each sleeve
And toss the knitted fibrous woolly garment to the side.
And I should like for you to pause, and let me capture that nape,
With the soft baby hair as it rises to the hair line proper nestling in
The vee of the second, third and fourth vertibrae as these descend
Into the gentle curve of the upper shoulder blades, just above the collar
Bone.
I should like to capture upon the page that incomparable movement
As you stretch your head up and back and rotate it just as you did with
Your feet. And swivel left and right. Allowing me to pen that chin,
That (is it equiline?, is that the right word? I am searching as I gaze) nose,
What is that word, the Greeks used it. Nefertiti? But, no I shall not compare
Your nose to a rose. I shall not fall prey to foul similes. No, I shall simply capture
Pen in hand what I see.
The nose, though. I am stumbling on the nose. How would have Flaubert described
Your nose. By writing so much of it, I draw our readers attention to it.
Perhaps, we can say that I have failed to write of your nose, I have stumbled
Over your nose. May this has happened throughout history as writers, just as I
Try to capture the essence of what they see.
(But no, no, no, I looked it up, poor writer that I am. The word I was looking for
(Was aquiline. Roman nose. With a hook! No, forget aquiline, forget equiline.
(Forget the nose. but wait a moment. You have one, what am I supposed to do.
(Let us say then that your nose remains an enigma. As in that well known smile.
(But what distracted me as I was caught by the inner gaze is of the flair of the
(Nostril of the Greek horse statue in Rome being attacked by a lion flared in fright,
(In terror. It is not the lion that capture one’s attention but this nostril, the essence
(Of the equiline.)
And now my gaze falls over the shoulders down those arms with the slightest
Suggestion of the lightest down. And I shall not talk of proportion, the proportions
Of your body or any body part. With the recent failure of the nose I shall move my eyes
In wonderment.
And now you reach behind with both hands to unclip the clasp of your brassiere.
But wait, I had not noticed your hands before as I do now. Of how they curve, how
do I describe those curves, one hand over the other. Slender, yes, Deft in their grasp
Certainly. And now you slide the side pieces each forward simultaneously
And allow the cups to free the breasts. And now I see what I had sought to see.
But what pen have I, what powers have I that can describe your breasts. Their skin
Colour matches that of the rest of your skin. The nipple is neither brown nor pink but
somewhere in between. Do they stand proud when you are aroused. Can you show me.
As yes they do, The point of my pen grows hotter. But does not write better.
With those nipples quite erect, now how did you do that, I didn’t quite see …
You reach down to the belt that holds your skirt to your waist. We are not going to
Waste time trying to capture the waist. And unbuckle it. But, here, you are in haste.
The belt you pull with a quick whish out of the loops which hold it home.
The zip unzipped, you stand from the chair and the skirt is already on the floor.
Did I capture that. No. No matter. I shall not ask you to go through it all again.
And there you stand, erect but not proudly so, aware of your own good looks
Certainly. Your knickers brief, true, but not so brief as to offend.
And so you lift a leg, arch forward, and pull down the not so brief briefs, down the leg,
over the foot and resume standing in front of me.
You have not looked at me since I started writing. Not that you have held your gaze away.
But more intent on what you were doing, responding to each action that I asked.
But now you look at me. Not intent, not curious, but straight. A straight look,
Straight into my eyes. But detached. No emotions, yet not stony. Were I to try to read
Your face, your expression, I could not. And I have avoided, mostly, such cliches as
The face being perfectly proportioned. True, I see not flaws. There are none.
And now my gaze lowers. I feel modesty must compel me to write of your knees
Your calves, your thighs, but I cannot. I am drawn to the small patch of hair. Where I have
Not smelt before, have not been aware of your scents, your smells, now I am. A slight
pungent smell. I have heard it referred to as the smell of sex. I look more closely and I
can see that the lips of your vulva, protruding below the pubic hair, is moist, with just
a hint of a drop of liquid.
But you step towards me, and I am compelled to lay down my pen and surrender.
Malcolm D B Munro
6 October, 2015
Filed under: poetry
