My love is too much It embarrasses you Blood, poems, babies Red needs that telephone From foreign countries Black needs that spatter The pages Of your white papery heart You would rather have A girl with simpler needs Lunch, sex Undemanding loving Dinner, wine, bed The occasional blow-job And needs that are never red As gaping wounds But cool and blue As television screens in tract houses Oh my love Those simple girls With simple needs Read my books too They tell me they feel The same as I do They tell me I transcribe The language of their hearts They tell me I translate Their mute, unspoken pain In the white light Of language Oh love No love is ever wholly Undemanding It can pretend coolness Until the pain comes Until the first baby comes Howling her own infant need Into a universe That never summoned her The love you seek Cannot be found Except in the white pages of Recipe books It is cooking you seek Not love Cooking with sex coming after Cool sex That speaks to the penis alone And not the howling chaos Of the heart