On the empty walls some of the newcomers
project their private, small Guernicas
which no one else can see–
while in the large room with the screen
Liv Ullman touches Max von Sydow
with a lust so deepened by grief
the rest of us feel our miseries
are amateurish, some of us are even elated
to have Bergman for such a friend;
oh come over for dinner, Ingmar,
and make our loneliness exquisite!
The woman sitting next to me, overweight
and beautiful, has been crying
since I took her hand and whispered “slit
wrists, betrayal, viciousness, anything
that Ullman does makes me happy”.
I’m not sure why she’s crying, but I know
how intimacy begins and it has begun,
I know that the best sex rises
like a trapped beast from our vacancies,
those openings we never knew were there
until touched. Ullman now
has offered her face to theologians
as proof there is a soul; von Sydow
is looking off to the side, afraid
to let go of some bottom of himself.
Later, the woman and I will talk about this
in bed, with pleasure.
Later, the newcomers will get tired
of their shadows and fall asleep by themselves.
This is the first stage.
The next stage is waking, a throwing off
of covers, and more covers; months,
years of it.
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