Iron Curtain

           Warsaw, Poland, 1988.

3 Minutes in the Closet meant

           another stab

at learning how to kiss,

wire hangers clanging,

a pair of gray galoshes

knocked across the floor.

Pressed between

wool overcoats and winter

scarves, I smelled

           the boy’s cologne,

like something furred

           had died inside his shirt.

Our teeth scraped together,

           the friction of a car

that drags its muffler down

as though to find a missing key.

He whispered Polish phrases

in my neck, your neck he said

your neck. I wanted words

that came out hot, American,

like kiss me fuck me fuck me.

           the screen dividing us,

touch the velvet part of him,

break the skin’s barrier,

inflexible and cold.