faltering
Carl Miller Daniels

skinny studious blonde-haired teenage boy
walks along
miserable, depressed.
actually, he is seriously mentally
ill. he will soon attempt suicide
and be sent to a mental hospital where
he will be diagnosed as manic depressive.
he will spend 3 months there.
for now, though, he walks along
alone in the woods, saying
“all causes are already lost and
all time is already wasted.”
he also says:
“hope is the mother of disappointment
and the father of despair.”
even in the darkness of
depression, though, he has sexual urges.
he strips off his shirt and carries
it beside him.
then he stops and strips off his
pants and carries them beside him,
too. he walks along in only his
underpants and socks and tennis
shoes. his underpants are
tight white briefs. his big
smooth cock is bulging against
the front of them, its head
almost peeking out and over
the tight elastic waistband.
soon he stops walking.
he strips off
his underpants,
his big gently up-curved
cock projecting
out in front of him
like a smooth pink sapling.
he strokes his big
smooth cock; he feels
like he is making love
to the woods,
to the sacred grove; he
sees pagan spirits all around,
and when
the cum begins to spurt,
he feels so good his
mantra is almost
silent, but, as if
to accompany
the very last spurt
as it dribbles onto
the fallen leaves,
as if by themselves,
his lips form the
words
“all causes are already lost and
all time is already wasted.”
and
“hope is the mother of disappointment
and the father of despair.”
he knows something
is going to happen.
he knows things can’t
go on like this,
the birds twittering over
his head, the sunflecks
on his
shoulders, mottling
his cock,
he sees darkness
on the horizon,
feels a dark-gray
shadow slowing down
the beat of his heart—
the future
blinks at him
like a bloated toad,
bumpy and full of acrid
nostril licks, the slimy
white sheen of
his own liberation curled
on the woodland leaves
like an afterbirth
for a
near-dead citizen.

Return to Archive