Stephen Mead






              Night Sweats

Flesh
fringes, the demarcations-----
yours/mine
                    melt:

Who are we?

Can you tell it’s some alley’s gin bottle river,
everything, the glass garbage
stream shining-----
the high delineations deluged delirious,
(deliver me)

Breathing fever,
chilled goose pimples, hair follicles
urgency-slick with the acetylene
perspiration burning faces,
features recognized and gliding
in a twist of limbs terrific-
ally terrified by
(I can be you and you can be)
liquid skin fire-----

the bad dreams
(get me out, love)
the D.T.s, these covers stick,
(you’re too delicate)
smoke, mist, adrift in
the pores leaking screams, sighs, foam-----
(Oh Jesus)
                 This is
(Where are)
                  some stinking strange
(my cigs?)
                   sweat-heavy rhapsody

Stephen Mead is an Outsider multi-media artist and writer. Since the 1990s he’s been grateful to many editors for publishing his work in print zines and eventually online. Recently his work has appeared in CROW NAME, WORDPEACE and DuckuckMongoose. Currently he is resident artist/curator for The Chroma Museum, which contains artistic renderings of LGBTQI historical figures, organizations and allies predominantly before Stonewall.

 
 

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