mmmcccxxxi

No Contact Boxing Match Ends in a TKO

     Almost tonight, let’s not and say we did.
                                         —John Ashbery

What is foreplay
but oodles of
TEASE in such

a scenario

as a long-

distance

romance?
Who’s on
top without

contact? Can’t
penetrate without
the glove on (or

in). So the gloves
are off! Again,
dispense (with) 

the impossibilities.
Forego the ob
vious, true or

false? Let’s
forego the
obvious,

true as it is.
I think it’s
time I knew

your address.
But, as a guess
timate: 4,501

miles. Wait,
isn’t that
written as if

the onus is on
me?  Hm.  7,244
kilometers...wait!

Isn’t that written
...onus on you?
Fine, then, and

don’t say it’s
only fair, as
nothing could

be fair here,
buddy: how’s
3,912 nautical

miles? Nobody
can call bias
on that number;

nobody’s stuck
with the onus.
Except the both

of us. An onus,
something that
given the circum

stances might be
said fives times
fast (an-onus-an-

onus-an-etc.)
so that it might
generate a

tingle, albeit
still a hypo
thetical vibra

tion? If we were
(and again, every
thing’s so impos

sible, so,
hypothetically,)
on the bridge of

the Starship
Enterprise,
and Cap’n

Picard were to
say (if we were
there but for

a short while,
surely it’d be):
“Make it so!”

I’d say, “Yes
captain!” And,
oh, a few short

minutes later,
“and by virtue
of the authority

in me, vested by
the Federation. . .”.
I get so giddily lost

in such a fantasy
spaceship romance
that I don’t even

notice you leaning
toward me slowly,
that is until our

noses are almost
touching. My
temperature

rises an instant
5 degrees Celsius
(so that you will

get it) and my
tears well up
as I just know

you’re going to
say “I do.”  Our
noses, at 2 inches

or 5 centimeters
apart, about the
width of a baby

tribble. My nose
being nearly at your

nose, a moment that

begins to happily
freeze, and then
you say, just so

that I can hear,
“I think I prefer
to see it lubed

when you’re
getting off.”
3,912 naughty

nautical miles
suddenly van
ish, the sci-fi

non-proposal
non-wedding....
I see.  So this,

you might think,
is what long-dis
tance “lovers” do,

how such a
thing might be
kept real, or,

(excruciating;

all-out wacko,

if you ask me)

at least be
kept just plain

naughty-call.