Mapplethorpe's Young Man with Arm Extended



She still had that same postcard framed, a black and white print of Mapplethorpe's Young Man with Arm Extended, on the left bedside table. She fell asleep to observing the man in the picture. He leaned out of the left corner of the frame, his arm outstretched, so that only a triangular fraction of his torso and a single black nipple were exposed. The corner of his left eye was hidden. His skin as naked and luminous as his smile. She traveled along the dark, bony shadows along his neck, gliding down the white mass of his arm. It was long and sleeveless and relaxed and it made her want to stretch her muscles out until she was light and thin and empty. The dark crevices along his fingers, neck, armpit and mouth and eyes breathed deeply into the bare wall behind him, into the bare space between him and her. To find happiness in emptiness, in a white cleanse. Was his hand playfully reaching out to her? No. She was convinced that he found happiness because he reached for everything, for anything, for nothing really.