Sidewalk

I'm eating cheesecake
I'm washing it down with Earl Grey
I'm listening to Duran Duran
I'm easily waiting to grow up
And in my leisure time
I'm taking timed sophisticated sips
I'm forking down dainty fork-fuls of cake
I'm hitting the bridge with timed precision
Take me home British Pop Sensations
I'm going to gorge myself with time
I'm going to get a stomach ache
I'm going to regress to my former self.
Take off my sunglasses when I wake up.

"Get Some Dental Floss!"

The note in my Marble Memo Pad reads as follows:
"Get some dental floss!"
I don't remember writing it and
I don't know what warranted the panic in my tone.
Was I eating steak? Or corn on the cob?
I haven't eaten cobbed corn in several years,
but I know this note isn't that old.
This must have been around the time when
I thought it was fun to walk around Wal-Mart's
health and beauty aisle, throwing toiletries in a
basket.
Maybe it's not panic, but sheer delight, in my tone.
I GOTTA "get some dental floss!" ASAP.
But there's still something uncharacteristic about
this note. I wrote it on a slant as well. An upward
slant that seems to shoot for the clouds.
I meant to write more important things in my
Marble Memo Pad. The slant is the growing
disappointment that reminds me of being a girl
who filled her purse with toys before leaving home.
Can't have an empty purse, now can you?
Did I ever "get some dental floss!"?
Only God remembers. I should ask him if I'm
still wanting for an answer.
Written on a slant, filling a whole page like a
teddy bear in a purse, it stands out blatantly.
I couldn't have forgotten this.
But somehow I did, I have blocked it out
and for good reason too.

N. Street

I walked a concrete catwalk
taking in the dragonflies that passed
by. I tried not to flinch.
I was barefooted and it was hot.
Had I more callouses I wouldn't have
felt how glorious the ground was.
I count small miracles as I carry
perfectly fine shoes. How can anything
ever be "perfectly" and "fine" at
the same time?
I carried fine shoes in my right
hand, hooked on two fingers.
Whenever I can, I take them off
and those creepy dragonflies in
without flinching at the warm
rocks I step on or the long stained
glass wings. Have you ever seen
a more perfectly primeval fly?
I have not.

I'm Good at This

What response can I give on the
inability to fall in love?
Never a good one, it's always one
that will only pass on basic appearances.

You're the Ben Franklin of love!
If that's what I am, I am.
6 scones and seven T's later
You've found my real aversion.

It's that emotional distance
between the kitchen tiles and
the left-over Lo Mein on the couch
The walk is longer than we think.

Just like I've never finished a
dripping cone---I'm not done
with my pretenses of loving
that boy, that strange one.

You can sit here and discuss
my inability to love or fall in love
What was the question? Whatever
looks best.

This is Why You Don’t Workshop with Ernest Hemingway.

He keeps bitching ‘bout my atrocious alliteration
Fuck you, I tell him and then I show
Him my cajones. He’s not impressed.
He says my rhyme and meter are mediocre
That I have no sense of adventure
Or heart. He calls me “girlie” and says something
Else equally sexist. I light a cigar for him
And ask him what to do about my last stanza.
“What would you do?” I ask him and then
Kiss his bearded cheek.

He’s a sucker for a feeble “girlie.”
He says to blow it all to hell and
Stop before it all gets to be too much.
With a flask of Jack in his Dungarees
And a shotgun in hand, he made it sound
Like I had nothing to work with.
Wildly weak with lacking alliteration,
My own flask of Jack was nearly
Empty before I called it quits.
Only then did he cut me some slack.
And I, being the affable girlie I am,
Took it whole-heartedly.