Strip

He smiled a playful smile and grazed my forearms with the back of his fingernails as he took a step backward and came to stand in front of me. He was bathed in the golden sunlight that now shot horizontally through the trees and covered everything with a surreal black and yellow checkered pattern. With the most natural, uncontrived movements of his wrists and fingers, he began to unbutton his shirt. I felt my eyes grow wider as larger areas of naked skin came into view, though it was clear that any provocation was intentional, because I was sure he was undressing the same way he did every night in the privacy of his bedroom.

Once the last button had come loose, the shirt came off and was discarded. It hadn’t even touched the ground that his hands moved to his belt: he bent his knees and his hips came forward as he guided the smooth leather through the buckle. When he set aside the ends and began working on opening his jeans, my breathing jumped out of its natural rhythm and I pressed my hands against the door behind me. My eyelids dropped, as though something inside me tried to warn me that what was to come would be too much for me to bear. He noticed, and yet he carried on unperturbed, and I reopened my eyes to see his thumbs hook under the waistline of his jeans and the black cotton of his underwear, pulling all of it downwards in one easy movement which left him stark naked, standing in front of me.

I waited for the impulse to avert my eyes but it never came. Instead, I looked at his face: his expression was relaxed, his hands open, palms forward, held out slightly from his sides. I suddenly understood: he wasn’t teasing any longer, he wasn’t flirting. He was coming at me unguarded, undisguised, no tricks, no weapons. This was the last layer, effortlessly falling, right before my eyes.

Stranger

I see you waiting in line with the others. You captivate me, your height, your posture. You are young, you are proud, you are confident, you are scared: I can see it all in your big blue eyes, in the way they search, in the way they ask questions. You are patient, but you are nervous: you are lonely among thousands.

And I wonder, what’s your voice like? Is it youthful? Do you worry the high tones will mean they won’t take you seriously? Or is it rich, older than the immaculate pads on your tender fingers? Do you speak often, do you like to sing? How many times have you said I love you? Did you mean it, were you frightened, or do those words still hang precariously somewhere between your throat and the chasm in your chest?

And I wonder, what’s your joy? Is it something as small as the kernel of passion locked away in the depth of your breastbone? Is it pure like the moonlight through a veil of tattered clouds, or is it marred with bittersweet memories of summer months gone? Did you kiss her? Did she let you take the place of her cotton skirt, sliding and grinding between her golden thighs?

I do wonder, what are your demons? Do you wear them around your neck, a silken noose that everyone can see, or do they dwell dormant in the marrow of your spine, waiting to uncoil like serpents out of the charmer’s basket at the first note of a well-know tune? Are they tame, are they guides, are they dragons spitting the kind of fire that consumes your days and makes your nights sleepless?

I see you waiting in line with the others, and I think this might well be the last time I’ll ever set eyes on your shoulders, and you don’t even know how much I’ve already wondered about the life that animates your skin. No matter. Be well, be kind, look after yourself. I wish you good luck, with love, with life, and with all the dreams that tickle your feet in the morning. 

The man and the boy

“Be a man,” the man said, and the boy listened, because that’s what he wanted, more than anything or anyone in the world, to be a man.

Oh but the man was desperate; he knew the boy was already a man, likely more of a man than he himself was, than he would ever be.

He was also angry; he knew that men like the boy always got what they wanted, for it was always already theirs. The truth burned, like a red-hot dagger thrust between the shoulder blades.

“A real man has honour,” the man said, “and acts for the good of the ones he loves, no matter what the cost to himself.”

There. The good of the ones he loves. The boy felt it deep inside his belly, the thought that had been haunting him, eating him up from the inside out.

“Yes, Sir,” he said, and tears began to well in his eyes. Men don’t cry, he said to himself, and swallowed them hard - like a man would - while the man looked on, a mask of calm concealing a storm of envy and guilt.

Into the labyrinth

mslabyrinth:

prompt: write a short poem or a bit of prose about your URL or any of the URLs you’ve had in the past as if it were a character.

Sittinbuddha thought she was so smart, until she walked through an iron gate wrought with vines and roses. The garden on the other side was luscious and green, brimming with flowers and fruit so bright and fragrant she had only seen their like in her dreams.

She walked through the paths and danced through the orchards so far and for so long, that in the end she lost her way, and with the sun quickly sinking below the horizon, she discovered the garden wasn’t really a garden, but a labyrinth.

With no light to guide her feet, Sittinbuddha staggered and stumbled forward, but try as she might, she couldn’t find her way out. Cold, hungry and scared, she crouched down in a corner, and was just about to fall into a desperate, sad sleep, when the Queen Fairy of the Garden appeared before her.

“What the fuck are you doing, sleeping in a corner? Get up!” she said.

Sittinbuddha was startled, and couldn’t reply. She just looked at the Queen in wonder; at her gown, made of spun sunlight, and her eyes, bluer than the deepest ocean.

“What the hell is wrong with you girl?” the Queen asked her, hovering over her.

“I’ve lost my way in the labyrinth and I can’t get out,” Sittinbuddha managed to say.

“Pffft,” the Queen scoffed. “That’s impossible. How can you get lost inside something you yourself built?”

Sittinbuddha looked at the Queen, puzzled.

“This shithole,” the Queen said, sweeping her arm across the surroundings, “is your place. You made this, girl. You wanna get out? Fucking own it!”

And so Sittinbuddha understood. She got up from her corner and approached the Queen, who, looking pleased with herself and with the girl before her, raised a hand to offer an enthusiastic high-five, before dissipating into the chilly night air, leaving Sittinbuddha alone in the midst of her own labyrinth.

Shower (NSFW)

He stepped in the shower and moaned out loud under the feeling of the hot water on his skin. God, it felt good. He’d always loved a strong hot shower, but this was pure aquatic heaven. He tilted his head sideways and forward, allowing the jet to hit his throat and his collarbones. He stood and let it rush between his shoulder blades and over his buttocks. When it hit his chest he felt the pressure on his nipples and his knees weakened. Instinctively his hips inched forward and he discovered with some surprise the massive erection protruding from the cusp of his thighs. He looked at it curiously, astounded by his own size. It was like looking at someone else’s cock, someone who hadn’t had sex for weeks, not someone who, like him, had experienced an earth-shattering orgasm less than a day before. He wrapped his hand around it to grasp its impressive girth and moaned again, this time a low, gravelly moan of desire. He could feel the blood rushing inside it, pushing against its tip, making it swell and pulsate. It was too late to ignore it, he’d have to do something about it. With his free hand he reached for the soap bar and brought it down to meet his own skin. He rubbed it up and down his length, enveloping it in a thick layer of slippery suds; he then tightened his grip and began to stroke it, slow and steady to begin with, but soon jerking faster and faster. Knees bent and hips thrust forward, he leaned his shoulders on the surface behind him and allowed the sensations to ripple through him and the pressure in his groin to grow. As he felt his release approach, he brought his other hand to cup his balls and squeezed, sending rhythmical squirts of white seed splashing on the wall before him. He released his breath with a groan and waited for the twitching to end. He shook his head, grinning. This had taken him by surprise, but it felt like he’d really needed it.