The videotape runs

silent, but life-size.

A bed.  A woman

and a man.  A woman

and a man.

A woman and a woman.

An old man and a child.

Two women and a man

one upside-down one

woman and two men

—The long black torn shades in the classroom

flicker like pigeons.  The A/V man or his boy

shuts the windows.

—Coney Island    blurred

density    a still.

A bed again, a man

alone holding himself

there.  Now a woman

sitting on the bed alone

writing on a film strip

I’ll ask when it’s over

I think but

it starts over

with this time

—did they last time?—real

faces and breasts and

hands and crotches and

I stay to see it again

to see if it’s me writing

it, that woman at the end,

that might make it easier or

not.  Or I might be

one of the others.  Or not.

—A siren goes by

down on the street, stiffening our spines.—No I’m not her

or anyone in it at all but here

it starts over and this time

—were they last time?—

all my friends.

You’re in it this time,

and me, too,

but each off    alone    clear

in the shot that was a still,

Coney Island, but animated

now, walking

smoking

playing the transistor radio.

Watching, you

touch my hand

with the hand not holding the radio and say

you never loved me so much

as this minute.  Tha A/V man

switches on the light: “Quiet!” and I see

all our friends are here

watching.  And here it starts over.