NECK MASSAGE

Upstairs room
above The Bar
Intimate
We were so close my bare toes
almost brushed against his knee
as I sat in the front row
with my legs crossed

The blues guitarist
gave us his best;
I was transfixed by his
amazing, agile fingers
and beautiful, sensitive hands

I was also in agony -
my neck needed massaging;
His screaming music matched
the mutilated feeling in
my upper vertebrae...

On the electric Fender
he was too Rachmaninov
for a rough neck;
the horny pads of his fingertips
thrummed too tight,
too intense along the length
of the guitar's chordal column.
And he hugged the slim pale body
just too close -
like a bad dose of stomach ache

But the acoustic:
He rocked and gently rolled
her fuller figure love-like
with circular motions,
caressing the strings
and striking them harp-like
to make them sing

He massaged her neck
like stroking that of a
gleaming white swan or
the smooth polished coat of his
gorgeous Black Beauty

* * * *

Acoustic analgesia
anaesthetised my pain...

Killing it softly
with his song,
as Roberta might say