Rough sensual face. Skin like pinched putty.
Lips, mustache, fat melt into the sardonic smile
of a lecherous saint. You, a fay seer, pull
a dressing gown protectively about your girth.
Where are your red Morocco slippers, your cups
of steaming coffee, your eighteen years
of courting a countess in another country?

...a woman's hesitation is sometimes more
of a blessing than her eventual acquiescence,
and he would fall into bouts of black rage.
The season of love...was allowing Eugène
to taste its first fruits. And however...
he was beginning to find them expensive.

Chasing one who didn't love you, you married
her and suddenly she was old. Much sweeter
at a distance-sharing bits of gossip, rousing
your ardor with her title as you wrote
of the bourgeoisie. Now you resemble a friar
out of Rabelais or one of your own roués.
Balzac, workaholic, why were you so unlovable?

I come from the wilds, I'm completely raw,
...and I counted on not falling in love....
I'm like Cerubino, every woman's lover, till
I find one I can really devote myself to....
I felt myself borne toward you as by a tide.
I'd thought so much about you!

BALZAC NUDE

I hardly noticed the bump on your nose.
Your arrogant body swells inside the plaster.
Robe off, arms folded-you become a burly
truck driver-your ordinary penis flows
into a giant pen point. Satisfaction seems
just around the corner. Are you still
optimistic, my lusty, operatic clown?

I've been fooled! They don't love me,
they've never loved me. ...If they haven't
come by now, they won't ever come....
They've never once guessed my pain, my
grief, my yearning for them; and they'll
never guess the meaning of my death....