sometimes i wonder if there’s something wrong with me
because sometimes and on occasion
i’ve been known to turn down perfectly good offers of
free sex
often with attractive people with whom it’s not inconceivable
that a night locked in passionate embrace
– all questions or doubts as to the authenticity of said passion left to one side for the moment -
might not be wholly without its pluses
and yet i walk away from these potential nocturnal encounters and
i wonder why
and the answer is this
it’s because i start thinking
and what i start thinking about is how
if i have sex with this person
it will mean a co-mingling of energies
we’ll be cohabitating the same space
swapping spit
we’ll be bending time together
and showing ourselves as naked and ridiculous
we’ll be intermingling our dna
we’ll risk exposure to viruses
there may well be a confessional period during which we feel compelled to
spill our deepest and most allegorically transparent secrets
and which will be acutely embarrassing in later reflection
we may reveal a particular fantasy that the other person finds odious
or vice versa
i don’t know which is worse
it could turn out that an unfortunate lack of good taste in undergarments is exposed
or that a refresher course in matters of basic hygiene is overdue
despite the deceptively clean exterior
a divisive difference of political opinions might disrupt the fragile boundaries of pillow talk
or wildly divergent dietary theories result in a disastrous breakfast-after
old religious battles might be revived within us
the march to arms of our distant ancestral clans still clamouring to
right ancient wrongs
we may find that each other sadly reinforces the altogether none too positive view arrived at thus far
of those of the other’s type
or worse we may convince ourselves
that we’ve found
love
and thus start seeing each other regularly
a few times a week
buy extra toothbrushes, that sort of thing
exchange house keys perhaps
publicly demonstrate our sexual partnership by the use of non-verbal signals
i.e. hold hands and attend to the slightest disarray of the other’s clothing
we may thrill to the other’s presence and feel desolate in its absence
we may not get sexually bored after 6 months
we may feel we are
happy
and then one day
suddenly and without warning
one of us may be unexpectedly killed in a freak accident
or fall in love with someone they run into at a high-school reunion...an old flame...
or turn out to be a
secret cocaine kingpin with another family back in colombia
because you never know

and so
although there is this small chance that we could spend a wonderful night together
in which we divulge no personal details
have fantastic underclothes
share a full english breakfast
and never see each other again
it’s all the other possibilities i worry about
which is why
instead of being in a single’s bar, or at a club night, or clad in latex at a fetish party,
or at one of those weird speed dating things,
i am at a poetry event
where everyone is sensitive and deep and couldn’t possibly have horrible politics
or at the very least
if i do get approached
i will know right from the very start
to enjoy
but not believe for a minute
the lovely words
which might lead me to accepting an offer of
free sex