We never do that anymore.

Whenever she asks me

to invite her out

for an evening on the town

for dinner and glancing

at others similarly coupled,

my excuse

is that my eyes

and mouth are exhausted,

so tired from talking to

and looking at . . .

By then,

she has faded wide away,

entirely uninterested

in what more I have to say.

And now

the accumulated fades

have produced an inaccurate

hate, (maybe)

able to cure a corrupted love

of the cinema, the theater, all of

these and those tragic shows

designed to inculcate desire,

enter-staining the mind

with spiraling blues and greens,

stirring one to envy

sticky figures

stuck in depressing scenes.