“Let Me See You Get Off” — Original Poetry By Karthik Purushothaman

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Cigarette butts

squeezed out, tar

ejaculate on

the marble floor

we were talking

 

around laptops

six websites open

white screen

exhibition

my friend happy

 

with government

decision that

put a stop to

institutionalized

consumption of

 

women’s bodies.

I pulled out

my spongy pair

of gloves, boxers

gladiators and

 

Ultimate Fighters;

kinesthetic acumen

wrestled

intellectual might

in a Green Park

 

flat turned cast

iron battlecage

superstructure

of human dignity

labour laws and

 

gender inequality.

My argument

really was people

eat, sell, cheat

torture, eat why

 

interfere with

perversion

and draw it out

to the streets?

You don’t place

 

whiskey next to

water at general

stores, people won’t

drink – my friend

gave last thrust

 

stroked his hair

and strode off to

get his. Breathless

in the darkness

between sheets

 

I was glad they

didn’t ban poetry so

I could spill this

one out: now let me

see you get off.

 

* * *

Karthik Purushothaman took three years to formally make the transition from aerospace engineering to creative writing; from Chennai to New Delhi. In this time, he has written two plays, five short stories, a record’s worth of songs and some poems. He is currently enrolled in the Creative Writing MFA at Minnesota State University, Mankato, commencing Fall 2015.

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