Phone Sex in Three Acts

Act I.

There is nothing noble about having phone sex
with your ex-girlfriend
in the bathroom of a friend’s apartment.

The shower curtain looks offended.
Tile ashamed to touch bare feet, toes curling.
Mildew in the bathtub corner is judging me.

This is no bad porno. No fictional pleasure.
I am only flesh, muscle, and blood. A collection of parts
that ache and spill over. She loves him now.

But we still search the static of each other’s lonely,
trying to pull and honest fuck out of the phone line.
Bears stir in our bellies. They slept a season and woke hungry.

Act II.

The audience holds their breath.
She moans theatrically and we are playing our roles just right now.
I fall into character without skipping a beat.

We both close our eyes
and pretend we are acting out our favorite scene.
But I am monologuing to an empty room.

My body echoing nostalgia,
harsh breath fogging the mirror
instead of dancing the nape of her neck.

I knew a girl once who had never touched a man
but practiced kissing with her vanity mirror.
We are much too old for this,

supposed to be trained better than barking at closed doors.
I want to say I’ve thought about the arched dimples
on her lower back every day for two years

but that’s not in the script.

Act III.

We just talk empty dirty until we come
and hang up as the credits roll our names.
Cleaning up to go back to our lives and temporary lovers.

I step out of the bathroom only as myself.
A tired spindle, a film reel unwound,
a man undone.

William Knudsen is a writer, musician, and arts advocate from Fort Collins, Colorado. His poetry has been published by The Legendary, Sparrow Ghost Collective Anthologies I & II, and Pipe Dream Journal. Knudsen currently resides in Colorado and works as director of an arts organization.