In an Empire State of Mind

This essay is about multiple bodies operating as one cohesive unit in order to serve a communal -as opposed to an individual function-, and going to the sleeziest gay bar I have ever been to.

On my trip to New York I found myself, upon the recommendation of a friend, at a bar called the Cock. The Cock is generally described as being one of the cruisiest gay bars in NYC. Not surprisingly, it is dimly lit. It is actually so dimly lit, that it is often difficult to make out the face of who you are looking at, and at times, is even hard to tell the shape of the body in front of you until you are touching it, or it is touching you.

This bar is different from other cruise bars, because it isn’t about what type of body you are attracted to. Instead, the attention is completely redirected from individual persons, to the actions shared with these persons. To elaborate more: generally, you would find someone aesthetically appealing to you, and then attempt to lure them off to a location with more privacy –be that a dark corner in the bar, or maybe an apartment.

At the Cock, the entire bar is a dark corner. You shed your individual identity when you enter the room. You are still a body, but you largely become an unknowable body. Because the bar is loud, and so dark you can’t see in large portions of it, senses of seeing and hearing are shut down. You can still feel however, so body language becomes your sole means of communication.

Shortly after arriving at the Cock, I learned how to properly cruise in this environment. Since I couldn’t rely on drawing someone in with how I look, or let them know I was interested in them through eye contact, I forced my way through the mass of flesh in front of me, to the most crowded section of the room (a midpoint between the bathroom and coat check). Once here, I found that what I needed to do was stand in place, allowing the bodies migrating to and fro -on all sides of me-, to touch, poke, and prod any part of me that they want; consent then, is largely implied by entering the room.

We could call this passive prowling I suppose. I am a sleepy lion, hiding in a thicket of gay male bodies, waiting for you to notice me and explicitly express your attraction, so I can respond (or pounce). Sadly, this isn’t much different from how I generally interact in gay bars.

My “efforts” worked. In fact, at one point in the evening I had two bodies drawn toward me at the same time. The body in front of me was far shorter than I would have liked, and their hand was very hastily trying to find its way inside my pants, toward my crotch. Behind me, another body belonging to a youngish bear cub homed in –this one I was attracted to. The cub’s hand was hastily trying to find its way inside my pants, toward my ass. I have never found myself in a position like this. Even verbal communication would be tricky, I believe. How do you –verbally OR non-verbally- communicate your attraction to one person, while simultaneously communicating that you are not attracted to another?

At a complete loss for words, I girated my hips backward while stepping to the side so as to convey my interest to one party, while distancing myself to the other. The result? I had opened the floodgates. The two bodies collided with each other full force, their limbs flopping everywhere. It was almost as if they hadn’t even known I was there. How carnal.

I remember when I was a little kid and would play with magnets. I loved taking the really strong ones you could buy in a pack of 4 at the hardware store, the kind of magnets that could attract or repel each other through our hardwood table –my mother still has this table. In this situation I was the table, and the two bodies –the one I was attracted to being the positive charged body, and the one I was not attracted to being the negative- were very strongly attracted to each other. When I left the picture, these two bodies propelled toward each other so violently they were carried further into the dark, out of sight. I stood there, sipping my gin and tonic, in their wake.

It didn’t appear that many people left The Cock with anyone. At the same time, it didn’t seem that anyone was getting off in the bar, as paid security was always present, pushing their way through the crowd, flashlights hanging at crotch level, voices snarling over top of the music. “Watch your fucking hands!”, they would say or, “Check your wallets!”.

The experience was surreal to me for two reasons. One it wasn’t about physical contact with a knowable individual. The contact you received was largely from persons you could not see. Second, because the end point for most people did not seem to be about having an orgasm. In this case then, I see the bar as providing strong drinks at a cheap price, and filthy cuddling to a beat. New York will not be lonely tonight.

I lured another man over. A bulky person by the name of Troy, he was from Queens. “Girl…you looking all sweet and innocent, but I-CAN-SEE-RIGHT-THROUGH-YOU. And you are a S-L-U-T!” We started making out hardcore after he said that, I have never felt more alive.