Poem of Summer 2018

Call me Sebastian

It's a honest name for me

since grandfathers

back in time had that name

Tennessee Williams wrote the play

the movie

“Suddenly Last Summer”

identifying the dead Sebastian Venable

as the major character

we see without his face

late in the movie

He has no face

yet we know he likes boys

and he's getting older

he's getting older

a bad sign for gay men

Cousin Catherine

now replaces mother Violet

for Sebastian

in his travels

to procure for him

To Mrs. Venable

Sebastian

is the be-all end-all stylish poet

His last trip to Cabeza de Lobo

with Catherine

he gets eaten by crowds

of boys driving him to the top

of the highest hill in town

It's a fag-bashing sure enough

There I was sitting in the back

of a Pontiac station wagon

at the Pines Drive-in

at a young age

with only my mother

in the front seat avoiding

my father for the night

to see this movie

and I stared

at the tight swim suits

on the beach boys

as Elizabeth Taylor

recounted her character

Catherine's terrors

the summer she escorted

Sebastian on his travels

in place of his mother Violet

Catherine suffers

post-traumatic stress disorder

as a result of what happened

to Sebastian

and says horrible things

Violet wants cut out of her mind

Sebastian didn't write

his poem of summer

according to his mother Violet

because Catherine

could not give him what he needed

lots of hot boys to stimulate him

they way he needed stimulation

Violet Venable wants

a lobotomy for Catherine

because she tells the truth

ooowwwieee

Violet lost her ability to attract

so she blames Catherine

for no Poem of Summer

to have been written by

Sebastian who writes

one poem a year

in summer

My mother was my Violet

dragging me around town

to the dress shops

the fabric stores

the shoe stores

her dress maker's

chin wags with her friends

baby sitters ad infinitum

the local television station

to the piano teacher

and put tears in my eyes

demanding I practice

refusing my desire to play baseball

putting me on every stage

and local television show

to play

I hid in the trees

to hide from you Violet

Any self expression

on my part

any outburst at school

was met with shame

shame shame shame

I treated girls

with great courtesy

polite courtesy

mustn't touch them

must treat them as untouchables

like your all-powerful mother

who trained you

from the age of four

to be a slave

to her desires

to eventually write the poems

that were never written

Get me a lobotomy mother

to take away all these memories

of not knowing who I was

of not knowing what I wanted

of only knowing what you wanted

of growing old now

an old queer

with no one who loves me

who kisses me on every occasion

I turned everybody away

who loved me

because I was suppose

to love only you mother

I'm far away in my own

Cabeza De Lobo

Here endeth my Poem of Summer

now let the boys eat me

Here's a bottle of hot sauce

and a tub of potato salad

Barry G. Wick

May-June 2018