About Face

Because life's too short to blush,

I keep my blood tucked in.

I won't be mortified

by what I drive or the flaccid

vivacity of my last dinner party.

I take my cue from statues posing only

in their shoulder pads of snow: all January

you can see them working on their granite tans.

That I woke at an ungainly hour,

stripped of the merchandise that clothed me,

distilled to pure suchness,

means not enough to anyone for me

to confess. I do not suffer

from the excess of taste

that spells embarrassment:

mothers who find their kids unseemly

in their condom earrings,

girls cringing to think

they could be frumpish as their mothers.

Though the late nonerotic Elvis

in his studded gut of jumpsuit

made everybody squeamish, I admit.

Rule one: the King must not elicit pity.

Was the audience afraid of being tainted

— this might rub off on me —

or were they — surrendering —

what a femme word — feeling

solicitous — glimpsing their fragility

in his reversible purples

and unwholesome goldish chains?

At least embarrassment is not an imitation.

It's intimacy for beginners,

the orgasm no one cares to fake.

I almost admire it. I almost wrote despise.

 

Passport

As an infant, I was kissed by Valentino.

Tango stain and sweat

bouquet of greasepaint —

an unnutritious — foreign taste.

Sandgrains!

The depilatory smell of elegant

black ironed brows — slight needle sticks

from razored check — the starry fangs

of slave bracelets and clove

smoke clasped in every fold.

Though I can't say I remember

being only nine months old.

Mother played the Wurlitzer

at local picture shows.

I give you her

rendition. She rose

solemnly from the deep

pumping and pressing

as the giddy instrument

was steeped in sunrise beams

and celluloid reeled

like well-behaved

ticker tape

through the narrow gates.

Her repertoire included STORM FUNERAL

GRUESOME QUIETUDE

THREE KINDS OF LOVE AND

NEUTRAL. But

Valentino — oh —

she wasn't equal

to the moaning hormonal

harmonies he needed. His swagger

rattled her. The six-foot

oasis — liquid

makeup of his face

razed her

to helpless arpeggios.

Our kitched thickened with stills.

Dad snickered at "The Sex Menace

on the Ice Box." Yet he fretted —

as if secretly crediting

the abductions of swoon

stare and burnoose —

when Rudy bowed

through town. Mother's connections ushered her

backstage and the scale changed

to the minute ahs and ooze

of a connoisseur

as she described the drawing

near. So close

she noticed the recessive

knife tracks in the deadly

jelly of his hair.

He clicked his heels and kissed her

palm, kissed the bald crack

where my skull's plates fused, fixed

or dismissed her

with his desert glance.

In some tellings, she held his hat

as if it might sprout antlers. Yes,

expand into a feral candelabra

while he held me,

reciting poetry

he had composed himself. He sold

Mineralava Beauty Clay

at intermission. Mother said he bungled

the ad by mumbling. Sound was

trauma. He was king of

costume, gesture, the skin

of drama. The erect pinkie

while sipping tea, the kiss he gave his sugar

lump before he slipped it in —

my mother mimicked every move

during bedtime stories.

In a bunting of Boraxed linen, I lay

smoking a thermometer,

listening to plots feverish

with disguise.

The Italian Valentino as an Arab

revealed to be a Scottish Earl — or a Cossak

passing as a bandit

who moonlights as a French tutor.

The Duke of Chartres posing

as the ambassador's barber — or descendant

of the mortal brother of

Krishna reincarnated

as a popular student at Harvard.

Mother recited every subtitle.

They surface sometimes, out of context,

while shaving or passing

the lap-dancing dives

on Seventh Avenue: DON'T BE SILLY MASCHA,

HE'S MASSAGING MY HEADACHE AWAY.

I've seen clips of his astounding dress.

Stitched in little festivals.

His suit of lights in Blood

and Sand. Harnessed in

bangles as — The Young Rajah? Stripped

to wasp-waist, heart-shaped

beauty marks — hose, wig, garters

as a queen

applies his lips

and simpering lackeys induct him

into lace jabot. A vengeful press

release portrayed him as

"supported by silken pillows,

wickedly smoking sheikishly

perfumed cigarettes."

And a machine dispensing orchid powder

in a men's room led the Tribune

to accuse him

of debauching U.S. guys. Right

After this publicity — was I two, three? —

my first memory—Valentino

died. L'homme fatal. Of peritonitis.

WILL YOUR MAJESTY KINDLY

SIGN THIS PASSPORT?

The cosmic master-

minds he kept — his spirit guides

and medium in Pasadena—failed

to see his early death. Would he have believed

a greater prophet? Darwin

said agents can improve

their futures without paranormal gurus,

improve by using

environmental feedback: market research.

The sweeps. And Nielsen.

When Rudy passed away, my mother's mind

became an intimate sealed place

my father couldn't fumigate.

Laced in mantillas

as long as she lived

on the day he died

she brought orchids to his crypt

and said her lines: "I am older —

tonight, Master —

but the love is the same..."

The tabloids named her

The Lady in Black. Of course,

there were imitations.

One year, five

morbid clones appeared.

But mother was the first. It was her

idea. Her vocation — almost —

you could say. It made her— well —

anonymously famous.

And Valentino was effaced

as consuming passions changed.

Those flappers who found themselved transported

in the dark have died.

Those tie - me - up

tie-me-down-those-whitely-flashing

eyes! It wasn't the irises

they fetishized.

It was the blanks that sang.

There was music in his reticence

for my mother. And he needed her,

she knew. Without her

was was The Great Lover?

Numb buzz and nuzzling

drone. A face sliding

down an astral shaft —

to mask the screen in dumb expanse.

 

Alice Fulton

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