more than life, the air, the way
On one of many mountains in a country far away
Resides a holy man who counts among the men he’s loved
His older brother, twin-like, jade-like, beautiful like god.
Did nineteen make a man? Did whorish eagerness and skill
Addict the boy, eighteen? Four thousand rules are carved in stone.
Indelible, his brother’s love upon his skin and soul.
A year apart in age, in temperament distinct, the two
Could each pass for the other by the time the younger turned
Eighteen. Eighteen and innocent of love he touched himself:
With wandering hands on his own body he discovered joy.
How could he know his brother watched him, hidden by a spell?
How could he know his brother lusted for his massive cock?
How could he know his older brother for the slut he was?
He was: the older brother lived for one thing: taking cock.
He was more man than cultivator, and more beast than man.
He’d worked his way through half the elders in his sect, then some,
When chance delivered him a glimpse of heaven: naked, wet,
Engorged: his younger brother: manhood monstrous, face and form
Exquisite as a god’s. I’ll have him or I’ll die, he thought,
And plotted. Scheming—waiting—watching—lusting—finally—
Seducing. Mere eighteen was powerless against desire
Evoked when expert nineteen plied his graces without shame.
The older brother rubbed against the object of his lust
And felt it equal in enormity to his desire.
Wangji, he said, I need you in me. Will you give me what
I want now more than life, the air, the way? What runs like blood
In my meridians is only love and lust for you.
How could eighteen resist a plea so pretty? Yes, he said.
Xiongzhang, he said. Touch me, his brother said. Right here—just so—
That’s so good—yes—oh, you’re a natural— And so he coaxed
And coached his younger brother in the ways of love until
Conjoined with him he reached, he thought, the purpose of his life:
To be just this: a sleeve, a vessel, for his brother’s cock.
As for eighteen: for Wangji: for the younger brother: he
Had never known such bliss. The grip, the heat, the friction were
Divine—but better still was knowing he was pleasuring
The one he’d loved, he thought, with unbecoming fervor all
His life. To be here now—in this embrace—to say with thrusts
And groans what he had never said in words—I love you more
Than life—the air—the way—to make his brother, screaming, come—
To come himself upon the sight so beautiful he cried—
If I was made for this, he thought—then who could blame him? I?
How can I blame him, husband mine, for his first love? How can
I fault him that he never loved me half so well as he
Loved him with whom he’d shared a womb a year apart? I can’t.
What I can do instead is wander far and wide and wild,
And give him time and space to have the love he holds most dear.
And beg you, stranger, for your ear: to hear me tell of him
Who loves his brother like a lover more than life, the air,
The way. I travel, and I leave to love these lovers kin
On one of many mountains in a country far away.