Frank Manley (November 13, 1930 – November 11, 2009) was an American professor and author.
ERASMUS IN LOVE
Cras amet 9ui nunquam amavit, quique amavit
Cras amet, Erasmus wrote. And then he reflected.
That girl across the room beside the stove,
That girl, he wrote, is in my head .
Those breast I see are bulging in the sockets of my eyes.
This table too is in my head.
He reflected the table like the girl reflected the heat.
Of the stove. These walls, these other people–
All in my head. She smiled, he wrote, smiling.
And now she’s talking . Now she turns. Her rump
Slides on the chair, flattened out on each side,
Bulging. She leans forward. Her breasts dazzle
My eyes. The light falls from the air.
It’s cold over here away from the stove, Erasmus
Wrote. The stove stinks like bacon grease.
Red with rust like raw skin. The people
Stink like the stove. The ice in the river freezes
ln my veins. Wh0 is that she’s talking to?
Erasmus wrote. Why does she smile at him?
If this is all in my head, she ought
To smile at me. he reflected. Everyone
Else in the room–the farmers, the merchants, the travelers–
All leave to go to the bathroom at once.
Winter blasts in.Wc are suddenly alone.
She rocks her chair forward at me, leg
Tipping leg, and l reflect her coming.
He wrote, unbuttoning her blouse. Her breasts
Swing free. She touches the nipple, smiling
At me. I am reflecting like a stove.
Winter blasts the room again. The people
Rush in. And she’s back in her place at the stove.
Why does that always happen to me? Erasmus
Wrote. Why does everyone always come back
From the bath room? Why do l always reflect things
Like that? he reflected. l should have said,
Here, let me help you, or, Hello, I am Erasmus.
Who arc you, inching your chair over at me,
Touching your nipples, spreading your legs? But how
Was l to know it wasn’t in my head
When everything else I see is there–this table,
These people, who never go to the bathroom any more?
And whose head am I in? Erasmus wrote,
And why do you always do this to me?
Why do you send her here, and others like her,
Wherever I go? They ride up on mules, sleek
And naked as the flanks of beasts, Eyes like cows.
Udders like goats,They make obscene gestures in upstairs
Windows, come out of dark woods, behind
Trees, around comers, They come at me
In my sleep and always walk past me. Erasmus
Wrote, because I suspect they are in my head.
All of a sudden he put down the pen and stared
Across the room at me, I tried to look busy,
The checkers suddenly complicated as chess, l started
To talk to the girl again, asked her her name,
She shifted her hips and squirmed a little, Erasmus
Still stared, So l figured, what the hell.
I took her by the hand and led her over.
l leaned forward. His breath smelled like fish.
l said, are you the illustrious Desiderius, Erasmus
Of Rotterdam, Light of the North? Yes, indeed, he said,
l am. Fingers twitching, I said, let me
Introduce to you Marilyn de Kooning. Delighted,
He murmured. I have often admired you from afar.
The breasts you point l have cupped in my hands.
The hands you hold in your lap like pigeons,
I have seen above my head nuking signs
From top story windows. Your eyes have ridden
Defore mc over the Alps. l dreamed of you once
In More’s garden, and at banquets of kings and great
Princes, you were under the table at work.
Excuse me a moment, Erasmus said, and he picked
Up thc pen. His eyes turned inward.
Hc started to fade, like light after sunset.
She stands up, Erasmus wrote, swings
A shawl around her head. Skin translucent
As the stove. She wails across the room.
Her ass shimmers like heat, and I am reflecting.
Years later, in the portrait by Dürer, his skin
Pouchy as unbaked bread, arthritic fingers
Like tendrils twisted beside a bowl of flowers,
Erasmus wrote a gloss on a love poem,
Explaining that it is all in your head.
Love will come in a rushing of wind, he wrote.
Lust will leap in your veins like a goat over
A fence, and you will see her, Erasmus wrote,
Naked as the sky in the summer. She will shimmer like heat
Coming toward you and say, Erasmus. Erasmus mine,
l waited for you beside the great oaks
On the roadway l heard you would pass.
l lingered at wells while my parents called in the dark.
I saw you from my bedroom window, with my husband
Asleep on the bed beside me. l waved at you
And showed you my name, gave you a sign of my love.
I have dipped my handkerchief in my own blood
And wiped your saddle, cut my hair and bound it
To the tail of your horse1o draw you to mc.
I sat across from you in the stove rooms.
Of innumerable inns while you wrote and looked
But did not see. And now you arc mine,
Erasmus wrote.We will love here forever.
This was in Washington, in the National Gallery.
I saw the wild flowers, the aged desperate
Face and took out a piece of paper
And began to write. He took off his clothes, I wrote,
His cassock, his ermine, even the hard-earned, stones
On his fingers. He lay them neatly in a pile
And walked toward her, shaking the wrinkles loose
As he went, shedding his skin like smoke in the winter.
She shimmered before him like sunlight on fast-moving water.
When the guard go to me, l had her dress
Half-way up her hip. A scream panicked
Inside her throat like the sound of hoofs in a pen,
And I thought, Erasmus, you old bastard you.