The Last Book I Shoplifted

‍ ‍Are his poems not literature pleading guilty?
‍ ‍‍ —Bataille on Lautréamont

was in graduate school
a foolish thing to do,
but still addicted to risk
I couldn’t help myself.

There on the shelf it sat like a dare
its proud spine dressed
in a dust jacket of pink and black
like a temptress in a poodle skirt
(I eclipsed it under my T-shirt)
Georges Bataille’s Literature and Evil
(the Calder & Boyars edition)
an invitation to a thrill
a brief affair that would turn
dead serious;
for forty-five years
it has gone with me
like an obsession
everywhere.

It occurs to me now that this is how
I met my wife of some thirty-five years
in the heat of a moment in a bar;
one warm December night we stole
each other from our dates
unapologetically
trusting there was something durable
under cover of such spontaneous
brass betrayal.

Outright theft and mutual temptation
literature and evil, excitement and sin
each transgression unrepeatable
each broken prohibition unique
never to be hurdled in the same way again.

Like a bee vibrating in a flower
like a flower blossoming in the fog
like a jewel blazing in the lotus
like a lotus blushing in the mud.

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