Voyage en Orient

 

The harder they come 40 x 50 cm acryl on linen canvas - available

FLAUBERT ON TOUR

Orange trees. Bamboo matting.

Glottal stops. Coptic

divines. Observing Max Du Camp get a hand job  

in the shadows of the Great Pyramid

   is an eye-opener, the Blood  

of Egypt spreading her lethargic thighs,

slapping the sides of our dirty bateau.

Breeze rises up, lifting caftans, exposing black asses

to frantic whippings for the fun of it. Were he alive

De Sade would have booked passage, learned a thing or two.  

And then onward to Constantinople,

mindless the whole way,

getting laid whenever possible,

thoughtless in Athens, too— you yourself wrote:

when the penis rises the brain dies—though

trained by class and romantic phantasy

to reflect on the glory of old Greece, the

inspiring nobility of mountain landscapes,

light, violet crowned hills, the whole 

kit and caboodle, laurel-wreathed, of received ideas.

Then back to France

          where the next best thing

to “skewering boys like kebabs” in a Cairo bathhouse

is barbecuing the bourgeoisie in their own backyards.