ALICIA OSTRIKER
291
"Rosy my cock" appears· frequently, usually in misadventures. Goodman
has a lot to say about the mathematical disappointments of the everlasting
hard-on, but it spring ever-eager, in bars, in planes , and on the college
lecture circuit. Some of the poet's amours are female; most are male and
young . One poem called "Youth and Age" begins, "Like a hot stone your
cock weighs on mine, young man ." It goes on, the thoughtful mind ticking ,
I
am
surprised you lust for a greyhead like me
and what a waste for me to grapple so much pleasure
with sliding palms holding your thin body
fumly while you squirm, till it is time to come.
Come, lad ...
and concludes wistfully
It is quiet on his little boat. "He's a noisy lover,"
I notice idly-the April air is keen-
"but he has no human speech." It's I who say
the words like " I love you " or " Thank you."
If Whitman won' t spill all the beans about the manly love of comrades,
Goodman will. But when things go merrily, an encounter with a Welshman
on a handball court ends in bed, where we "make love instead of war" (this
is in 1941, the beginning ofWorld War II) . Paul and a lanky buddy having
fun in a car conquer the ire of a traffic cop in the Anacreon-imitation " In
Traffic"; pleasure and generosity occur, even love does, and the poet thinks
back to conclude that his lust' 'made me comrades, as
if,
in so far , / we had a
decent city. ' ,
Fictionally, Goodman sometimes creates a half-fantasy situation which
is a positive inversion of Kafka's fictive premises. Everything is realistic, ex–
cept the people are wiser and softer than in our world ; in these dreams (e .g.
" A Celebration," "The Break-Up of Our Camp") , Goodman considers
what "intrinsic" or "necessary" joys and sorrows would remain
if
the world
were a little closer to his heart's desire. The interpenetration of fantasy and
reality rests just below the surface of his poetry, with the fantasy always a
matter of what he thinks could really be for people :
You ask what is the bay with the statue
down there and the new bridge across the Narrows;
I call it " Splendid." And the phalanx
of Manhattan's warrior skyscrapers,
,I call them " Towering."
