Veiled!

The boy—that royal epithet,
Princely designator,
Superbly poignant moniker
Of entrapment—
Is finally coming out.

He doubly distances        in distributive pronoun
In a separate debate        worriless.

It was all a joke for many years—
In many many
Many girls—
Until the game’s laugh bit him:
Look back desexed and incredulous, lad.

There was no suggestion for that:
They don’t want it to be here.
But it is; and that boy:
He rode safety-capped rhythms;
Found another word for queen, babe.

A little like Prince, he digs away in beret (yellow)
Giving out mixed messages and slights of biro—
Brutus stabs in ignorance and cockiness.
But he knows, he knows:
Every myth is a run from that capped cop.

Settling in feels disingenuous, but very easy:
Rolling symbols and comedy, less tragic,
Less Titus; and references and anything other than
Getting to the point—the sad fictions.
But real! Real! Veiled!

And he plays and plays with the subconscious—
There is no giving it another word—
There is no hiding from it…

…And drums and tall tales from a drinking hole, still;
And substitutes and associations and goalposts;
And itching and itching and just twinging behind the cheek:
Just speak of one girl
—One girl!—
And strip it back with a couplet
For all the naughtied Pans…

A zealous fairy piper!
A changed whistle pointing the way!

The final aces coming out in bits.