conquest. 2014

  

I am not Alexander

from that Old Sanskrit poem

 conquering nothing

not even her heart

still I linger in that same city

overlooking that same rive

r the 7th heaven on the hill

with its string of rooms

at the end of which there is

only one bed

 one woman sleeping in it,

that shining Jewel still

glowing on the horizon

still a memory of her there

 forever even though I know

she might not be there someday

I am no Alexander

 who has conquered all

I dwell in the memory of only one conquest

 I would have made

if I could if I could go back

 to one city, one house, one room, one bed

where one woman resides

And one heart I need to conquer

email to Al Sullivan

Don’t know how to stop aug 30, 2024

 

I ought to stop

each post from the past

digs it all up again in me

so I begin to feel now as I did then

when I thought it was all behind me

 when in truth it never is

when feelings as go as deep as these

 they cannot be exhumed only buried

and perpetually they try to rise up again

so each breath I breathe today

is filled with what came then

and recalling those days

digging them up even faster

 bringing them to the surface

makes it impossible to bury them again

I feel as I always felt regardless

of time or distance or all the other stuff

that clutters the in between

I ought to stop

 but each time I try

 I feel the impact of endings and loss

and so I must keep on digging up

 re-examining feelings

that I always secretly felt

even when I pretended I didn't

 

email to Al Sullivan

precious stones 2014

  

my love is not a diamond

 as some old poets might suggest

no sharp edges upon which

 I might cut myself

nor is she a nugget gold

 so Grand all men lust after her

 precious and yet not as appealing

 as I might achieve

 my love is a pearl

her skin so smooth

her touch so cool

easy to take under my tongue

to revel on her

to digest her

 as if I am the oyster that gave her birth

my fingers stroking her

 polishing her

feeling her curved flesh

 as vivid in my brain

as if I could see her blind

more precious than all

the precious stones

and all I could ever want

email to Al Sullivan

Kind and true aug 5,2024

  

ancient poets tell us

that she being free

or witty or pretty

does not always make her attractive

but rather how kind and true

a quality I'd not appreciated

 that for the right partner

the fitting partner

she can be kind and true

the rest of us lost in the fog

 of our attraction for her

her will, her eyes

 her smile, her breast

building a fire in our hearts

over what we see in her

 but maybe not what she is inside

kind and true

this aspect the most attractive

and yet all the rare

set aside for some lucky man

who is gentle enough

 and kind enough

to see who she really is inside

email to Al Sullivan

A kiss thief Oct. 22, 2025

  

I can’t say for sure, who kissed who or even why, a stolen kiss in the dark of night, I would never give back, a thief in the night who steals kissed whenever I can, filling a vacant space with them for a time when I might be too infirmed to steal anything anymore, a bandit who uses kisses instead of a gun, stopping you on the street demanding affection instead of treasure, no mask – maybe only a patch over my right eye – to delude you as to who I am and what I’ve come for. I always love to collect, steal your lips, maybe your heart, to keep it forever, long after you may have forgotten why I came at all.

email to Al Sullivan

Ghost of Four Star March 28, 2026

  

Four Star isn’t Four star, even though the sign in the parking lot still bears that name, and inside as well as out, it looks the same, red and silver glowing on a street made heavy by the mausoleum-like performance space Catholics used to use to crucify Christ every year this time, a place still filled with the echoes of His passion, I brought my mother to see back in 1976, though these days I’m more haunted by the sacrifice in the Four Star the back of my hands still bleed from self-inflicted wounds, ghosts of the past always here to haunt us, even after all these years.

 

email to Al Sullivan

The drip July18, 2015

 

 

It drips onto her lips and I can’t resist, a Chinese torture that so pleases me, though as I look down into her upturned gaze, I wonder, does she like it as much as I do, and what more I could give her to please her as much as she pleases me, the drips of it onto her lips, and hips, and all her exposed parts, and then into the space unveiled when her legs part. I am a filling station that fills her up, not with petro, but with someone much more potent until my tank runs dry, and all that is left is the drip, drip, drip, and I wonder, does she like this the way I do, or am I just wasting time, torturing myself, looking to paint her with what I have do offer. Does she want it, too?

email to Al Sullivan