When the Secret Hour of Pleasure Nears is a collection of poetry by T.S. Simmons. The stunning photography of Cameron MacMaster adds a unique visual dimension to the rawness of the text. The themes of love, death, sex and the isolation of insanity, resonate throughout this unique volume.

when the secret hour of pleasure nears

the poetry of T.S. SimmonsBy T.S. Simmons

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2011 T.S. Simmons and Cameron MacMaster
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4620-0976-3

Chapter One

    when the secret hour
    of pleasure nears


    I know
    a girl
    her eyes
    veiled in darkness

    not the darkness of Montmartre at night
    with warmth reflecting
    in the shadows of the boulevards

    rather
    she resonates
    fevered images of sex and death

    myself to unearth

    if I come home

    to discover

    her presence

    haunting the spaces
    beneath the floor, and through the mirrors

    I can't even look there
    I never could.

    Her desire to possess me
    Is a violent secrecy

    Each of us has his own Infernic visions
    tapping vaguely upon the door

    I've been choosing to hide
    In momentary stupor

    From the aching thorns of love.

    My imagination soars on lonely nights
    when the secret hour of pleasure nears
    to search within the darkness
    for the beauty of your flesh

    Your taste intoxicating
    and resting upon my swollen lips
    which blindly beg in throated whispers
    for you to poison me
    with
    sacred
    venom.

    I studied your profile in the shadowed café
    As drunkenness afforded me the courage to stare
    Upon your rapturous eyes
    Stark amongst the fragile paleness
    Of your skin
    I lit a cigarette to conceal myself
    Within the morbid pleasures of night
    Though you tinted the spirals of smoke
    With enflamed passions
    And sadness.
    You traced your hair, unconscious
    Of the muted tones
    Resounding within my deadened ears
    I desired to grasp my remorseless heart
    And taste the wine burning upon
    Your lips

    Thank you for your constant and
    Ill disguised blessings
    They rest upon my skin
    And burn translucent
    Into the night

    I sat in paralysis
    Upon the jazz soaked corners
    Of my early-morning bed
    And smoked while
    Thinking of you

    You probably didn't even know

    Lady, where have you been
    I have a bottle of wine
    In your name alone
    My lips dry
    With longing

    I have never believed
    In love, nor life
    Though I may reconsider
    Within your lustful
    Presence

    Come stand at the window
    The soft drapery
    Will shroud you against
    The icy kiss
    Of evening

    And I, caressing
    The sweet impermanence
    Will quietly lament
    The exodus of
    Beauty

    She bent
    Effortlessly
    Her hands of tiniest ivory
    Fumbled with the lock
    And summer's brazen air
    Held the intensity of promise


    A drink? She asked.
    Yes, oh yes.
    Preferably of you.
    I thought as
    My black boots
    Sullied the pristine floor
    Of her kitchen

    Later
    Naked upon the floor
    Her lips were wet with
    Deception and desire
    I kissed them

    She laughed, then said
    My husband will be home soon
    I watched the dust from
    Her gathered blankets
    Dance in the dying sunlight

    There's still some wine left, I said
    Her response, "take it with you"
    Was shadowed by her footsteps
    Heavy and sad
    Upon the bleached oak

    Soon, I found myself
    Walking the long, narrow trail
    To the highway
    Clutching the sweet Amarone to my heart
    While thinking that the night
    Was failing to taint
    The beauty of summer

    And that life would struggle impotently
    Yet fail to taint
    the beauty
    Of love

    Your skin is a tapestry of artistic beauty, I said.

    Is there any other kind of beauty? You said.

    All artistry is beauty, waiting on you to drink of its lure.

    To drink in it, you said.

    I thought

    Sometimes flowers come from within. They leave us speechless. Drowning in so much beauty
    that it

    Bleeds through from our own lacerated roots
    capturing us, like children
    in the opening orchids that scented the night

    Later, since we could not escape, we fell into sleep
    the scent of the orchids
    a part of us forever.

    There are figures on the Allen Wall
    Forgotten words and images.
    Graffiti. Blood.
    And three-foot white letters
    "I still love you Jane".
    I loved her too.

    Cars weave in broken synapse
    Beneath the barrier.
    Unaware of our love for Jane

    And we take comfort
    In our ignorance
    Of the muted strangeness
    Found written
    In love's grand irony

    Love amid chaos
    Beauty amid death

    Among the wine bottles
    She and I
    Were laughing. Crazy. Drunk
    The city, shuffled beyond the window
    Impervious and maligned
    To our blessedness.
    Then she laughed again
    And
    In a sudden, quiet moment
    I saw that her eyes were sad.

    When your reflection danced
    Upon the water
    Of the copper fountain
    In the Old Clock Hotel
    I was taken for
    But a moment

    When we fell together
    In desultory embrace
    I was distracted and
    Hardly noticed
    At all

    Later, in the cafe
    I commented on the wine
    But not your
    Eyes

    If I knew I would not see you
    After that day
    I would have said:
    That your lips
    Faded in winter
    Had forsaken none of their
    Beauty

    And

    That I envied the
    Ripe and scarlet berry
    Caressed gently by your
    Tongue

    On this
    Loneliest of days
    In shadowed April
    The artifice of shelter
    Does not hold me.

    The soft
    Lull of traffic
    Though deceptively serene
    Make indistinct
    Love's reminiscence

    But does nothing
    To diminish
    Your forceful beauty
    The rain falls
    Defeated

    How much wine is too much?
    She asked

    Her Question
    Poised and serious
    Though I thought
    Rhetorical

    Naked
    But for the bedsheets
    She wore with
    Quiet Dignity

    Unfailingly
    The heiress
    Of my fumbling, strident
    Desires

    You seem to have
    Spoken of me
    As a judge, articulating his
    Hollow mercies
    Upon the condemned

    I, who have worn your costumes,
    Stood upon your stage
    Reading of your broken lines
    Stale with promise

    I, who not long ago
    Stood upon these very steps
    And listened to the sad wail of traffic
    Echo your mournfulness

    You have desired
    A creation in your image
    Strange and human God
    Your death rattle shriek
    Is flooded with sad vanities

    You will not hold
    This poet, who defiled and,
    Drunken, yet sublime
    Discards the rusted flecks
    Your philosophy affords

    I, who was born,
    In country pale and feeble
    Am not anemic with
    Its culturally thin blood

    You are mistaken
    If only in your belief
    That I resonate
    The empty, gluttonous howling
    Of my supposed national legacies

    I, for this reason,
    Am grateful
    That the spirit of my drunken flesh
    Has rewarded me
    In kind

    Let me look
    Upon this trinity of beauty
    A poet condemned
    Before the fair selection
    Of countenance

    Each flower
    Would tend to drown
    Passionate ambition
    Beneath the sensory exaltations
    Of vision

    The evening
    Sad with desire
    Bounds me ruthlessly
    Within my unavoidable preference
    For your
    Incendiary
    Heart

    We all desire
    The delicate tortures
    Afforded by love

    Seeking refuge
    In poisoned flowers
    We grasp and crave
    Its sickened fevers

    The kiss
    Of its sweated whip
    Upon our flesh
    Consumes the sanity

    Leaving us
    A faded lyric
    In the elegies of
    Regret

    And you, yourself
    Ran your hallowed tongue
    Along the contours
    Of my chest

    And drowsily
    remarked upon
    The sweetness of
    My blood

    Summer's daughter
    O sweet and naked
    Mistress of nature
    Wearing the glow of earth
    Upon her beautied cheek
    Her feet touching
    The blankets of heaven
    In sensual reflection

    Friday comes
    And scatters upon streets
    That reek of
    Savage melancholy
    As my distortions
    Are cast forth from
    The drunken eyelids of
    A wounded lover

    Shadows shall claim refuge from
    The winter's bleeding sun
    In this drowsy hollow
    Untouched by the intrusions of
    Exaltation and light
    My wine-stained fingers
    Gnawing restlessly at
    Hopeless corruptions

    Insanity's feast
    Is laid in brutal honor as
    Death stoops to claim her
    Hallowed Knighthood
    Adorned in flesh
    With laughter now
    Shaking me woken
    In holy confusion

    My visions torrential
    Though lighting the strange atmosphere
    Her quietude presence
    An open lotus
    She delicately removes
    Her tiny coat and
    I am caressed in permanence
    My heart in belief

    That

    Even the saddest of days
    Can own moments of
    Purest beauty

    Paula, I remember
    The delicate pallor of
    Your childhood face
    And soft smile laced with sadness
    Belied your false innocence

    I can see your hazy shadow
    Behind the screen door
    A petal among
    The strange flowers that fell
    In the evenings of summer

    Though our woods, now
    Lie as raped and tattered
    As the boulevards of youth
    The wounded tranquility in your eyes
    Haunts me still

    Time, you whore
    I feel your insatiable hands
    Rifle my clothing
    As I lay drunken and passive
    Upon the winter earth
    A victim of your subtle thefts

    You appeared at my door
    Masked in hyperbole
    The ringing of telephones
    Stopped and
    Secret moments
    Began

    I loved you in September
    The sun came purposely
    Through the window
    To lay itself upon
    Your vigorous body
    In silent conversation

    To which you responded in kind
    And I struggled with your beauty
    My fingers, spellbound pilgrims
    In the fragrant orchards of your longing
    I overheard my muted voice say

    I will uncurl your passions
    Like trembling leaves
    I will be mentor
    To your hidden desires

    As she lit a cigarette
    I saw her face in the
    Crimson fireglow

    Standing above the
    Subway grates, and framed
    In billows of steam

    I thought that
    She was the most beautiful thing
    In that city

    At 3 A.M.

    She said
    "I'll be 36
    In ten short days"

    Marilyn
    Bless her gentle beauty
    Only made it that far

    "Thirty Six"
    She repeated
    Like a funereal dirge
    "What happened to the time?"

    "Yes" I said
    "The sweet voices
    That carried upon
    The surface of the lake
    Are fading to a
    Soft twilight whisper"

    "And death,
    Waits peacefully
    Beyond the
    Blood Horizon"

    "That's so depressing"
    She said
    Attentive now

    "No" I said
    "Death is kind
    And persistent
    In its reminder
    To adore the moments

    Soon to be reclaimed."

    I can see the faint light in the window
    Of the house that cast its shadows long and bleak
    Upon my conscience, bludgeoning me
    To walk slumped upon the brick laid sidewalks
    While in the peripheries of sight
    Ghosts would linger in velvet cradles
    Waiting to occupy the decaying bones of youth

    Within the minds of the condemned
    It is said that freedom reigns supreme
    And I, too can swear upon these truths
    They run silently as rivers in the blood
    To rise and overflow along the banks
    With the languid moon hushed
    In the suffering midnight sky

    I would seize my chest in terror
    Amidst the paralysis of nightmare
    As in vision I lunged weakly
    Toward the bleeding torrents
    My flesh was torn upon the salted earth
    With echoes of Miserere dying
    In the desiccated chambers of voice

    Now the light is ashen
    The broken dawn spills between
    Houses, resting in decay
    And along the emptying streets
    Specters prowl the soiled city arches
    Though burdened with fear they fall gently
    In hushed retreat

    The wail of night, in death
    Stretched into soft-grey sky

    And she told me to leave

    Her bedsheets scattered
    Like bleached bones
    With the bottles
    Upon the floor

    Remind me
    Why I am here,
    At all
    I whispered
    But she was

    Unamused

    As
    The great absurdity
    Of Mornings
    Was illuminated
    With the lady
    Prone to
    Incessant thoughts

    While the poet
    Momentarily
    Loses his power
    And shuffles onto
    The burning
    Streets

    Upon my death
    File silently down the fractured streets
    And return, your arms weighted with wine
    Let the bottles burn their amber shadows
    Like tattoos, beneath your skin
    In place of the hollow recollections
    Forced upon you

    Upon my death
    Concede defeat to passions
    Held upon your wearied breast
    Let them carry you, unbridled
    Into the arms of an open lover
    Into a flesh untainted and wild
    Absolved of illusions

    Upon my death
    Taste the lips of prose
    For she will eventually appear
    On the street corners of your existence
    To steady you, as you rise to commence
    Your stagger into oblivion
    To join me

    I do not drink of your poisoned offering
    Your holy water is stained with duplicity

    I do not mouth the empty rituals
    That your sages bear upon their virgin tongues

    I do not scour the pages of your canon
    Forever to be stained with virtue's blood

    You have tasted the communion bread upon your lips
    And felt the empty sacrament burned upon your breast
    Though your G-d shall not devour your flesh

    I have stood inside your grand cathedrals
    My feet upon the dusty stones
    And eyes upon your revelation walls
    Adorned in artist's tapestries of scorn
    Held furtive from your covenant
    Where kings lie tranquil in their blessed rot

    I have seen your gilded beasts
    Annihilate the blind philosophers of truth

    I have dreamed the poet exiled from your cities
    Consecrated in his grand illuminations

    I have heard you torture broken whores
    Thereafter taken to your beds in silence

    I sway majestic in my untamed exodus
    The mortal angel rises from the earth
    I throw myself in rapture at her feet
    And embrace the crumbling remnants of my divinity
    By worshipping at the sacred altar of her thighs

    On your birthday
    Tell your rhapsodic admirers
    To abstain, this day of days
    From drinking of your winter eyes.

    That is to say nothing
    Of lips, holding vigil
    To finally conclude the trinity
    With breasts, perfect and desired

    Let their awareness fade
    Unto the ever noble visions
    Of a woman who ages
    With passions unfurled

    I remember Beth
    Leaves in her hair
    A gift from the trees of winter
    When we walked in the park
    The taste of snow upon her lips
    Was gift enough for me

    I remember Beth
    She read Irving and leaned
    Close to me
    As I lit her cigarette
    and inhaled the scent
    of sweat and beauty

    I remember Beth
    When I walk alone
    Touching my steps lightly
    Upon the earth
    So as not to disturb
    The virtue of her memory


    Your legs moved sweetly upon
    The scorched sidewalk, then earth
    The brutality of summer was at odds
    With I, its putrid angel

    I watched the city workers run
    Their complimentary deceptions
    From the grimy steps of
    The Hotel Normandie

    In the quietude of city afternoons
    Time can flicker like candlelight
    And realities of moments, lost forever
    Are as heavy as the sweet, punishing air

    So much of each life will
    Crumble to beautified dust and
    The most skilled archaeologist
    Will never unearth your existence

    But countless minutes had vanished
    Since my eyes had found
    Your legs, and followed you into oblivion
    Or, the bar you entered at 9th & Main

    Emptiness does not consider me a stranger
    I am devoted to the warmth of darkness
    You were amongst the scattered patrons
    Where the neon sign flashed "open"

    Again there were your legs and
    A cigarette butt upon the bar
    So sodden and frayed
    I would have titled it "pain-abstract".

    I searched your vacant eyes and
    My own reflection, was the reason
    I did not need to speak nor
    Fumble with your beauty

    I sipped the thin wine
    And watched the moisture
    Gather upon your cheeks in
    Anticipatory bliss

    In that curious instance
    Unscathed by broken cliché
    And within the contagion of silence
    We disappeared together

    To run, in haunted lust
    Onto the sidewalk now flooded
    By the recently busted hydrant
    Glowing red in the sun

    I thought your legs were endless
    Your taste, sublime
    Sometimes, the ambiguity of paradise
    Can bear striking resemblance to

    Room 202

    I will wander kindly
    Beneath your sky
    In hemorrhage asylum
    Tasting the scattered
    Voices carried upon
    The heels of floating paper

    I will stand estranged
    From mother night
    She has abandoned her
    Ragged orphan
    To the surrogate whores
    Of the city

    When the air burns heavy
    I can feel myself dying
    And stare into the windows
    At the twisted fragments
    Of your acid couplings

    To the stockinged beauties
    Whose boredom is an art form
    I view your galleried sufferings
    With vacant companions
    In successive encounters

    And say that

    I will take the
    Sweat of
    Summer girls
    Sweet
    Like wine
    Upon my tongue

    And watch in isolation
    This ritual
    Searing of the earth

(Continues...)

Excerpted from when the secret hour of pleasure nearsby T.S. Simmons Copyright © 2011 by T.S. Simmons and Cameron MacMaster. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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