Now I wanna be your dog. I'll graze your feet on all fours and beg for scraps. If you drink yourself blind I'll be your instinct guide. All you gotta do is sniff my behind - oh baby, now I wanna be your dog. Go ahead, blame it on the egg nog. Pull my leash and I know I'm alive, you're the master I've chosen from the crowd in this dive. Use me up, laugh, give your friends a high five. I don't care 'cuz I've turned off my mind, yet I know what I'm doin' and my pockets are lined.

The shivering charlatan struck a bargain.

"Give me your coat and I'll grant you the power to seduce just by writing a note."

You were skeptical. You'd long been weaving words to that end, only wound up with pieces of yourself to mend. But your heart took pity on the guy. You agreed to the deal if only for a story to describe. Soon you were lost. Snot dripped down and froze on your lips, you scrawled a plea for help on a White Castle bag. A handsome stranger beamed at you; if he had a tail, it would wag.

Shaken, shivering, can't stop blithering, about the thing that makes me sing and float about like I have wings.

I dreamed of you before we met, tried to will them lucid and catch you in a net. Didn't know if dreaming was the closest I could get. But now you're here beside me, dear. Don't know if beer will still my nerves or rush our time by in a hungry blink. You buzz me so I don't need to drink, but I clutch at the glass, a shy lass not wanting to sink. If loves a skunk - boy, I stink.

You think folks need to be spoon fed. Through this belief you're soon led to be resentful of those who feed off sweat of your brow like nectar. You lose your shit and start to hector, your words poison drops sent on a vector. What you think are words of love sound like a lecture; what you think is truth is the Gospel According to Conjecture. You ignore the toxic and are rendered ataxic. You think you're unique but your symptoms are classic. Feelings overwhelm, so you reach for plastic distraction to gain traction and high-tail it away from yourself.

Witnessing your concert, through celluloid three decades after the fact, seared through my retinas like a burning bush of truth. I've never been the same since.

If the subject of you comes up I corner anyone I can like a lunatic clutching Bible cartoons. I bid them "come ye and learn how to pray...break down and let it all out...don't let me be misunderstood..." Through you I feel like a fountain of good, your words and spirit like food. I feel I've no choice whether to dance or to brood, the answer is obvious; the spirit, she moves.

You covet anything you don't understand. You color in your blind spots with what you think you lack. You squint to make out the exact cut of the teeth of the imaginary key to unlock your fantasies, the thing you're sure others are purposely keeping from view. You break your enemy's toy and dissect it. You can't see what makes it tick when you've forced the life out of it. Your fear makes you miss the magic. You bait traps, say mysterious chants, paint the air with made-up romance, when all you have to do to understand is ask.

I romanticize that I'm from nowhere, a smooth, fingerprintless specter. If you spoke my name it would fizzle like dud fireworks, meaningless to the ear as a weather report for a city never to be visited. It can be fun to run away from yourself and take on other identities like Silly Putty, stretching and rolling them to challenge your creativity. More fun than being from a generic suburb, from an overcrowded family where I'm superfluous as a mustache drawn on Nietzsche, from abandoned rooms where I piece together the world in song lyrics, not knowing what else to do.

I'm depressed but an optimist. I cut through the cotton haze of clouds, grab the silver lining like a carrying strap and stomp on through this green 'n growin' land. I see what I want like an uncolored picture beckoning me to grab a crayon and make it my own. Today I may look stupid trying unfamiliar steps but tomorrow I'll dance like I breathe. If I see sadness in others I want to fix them. It backfires when they defend their modus operandi of burying their faith behind dry wall, thinking it's of no use but mockery.

I have a boring job, nothing to pin to my name but a B.A. Bloodline-wise, there are so many of me a metaphor of deer hunting and overpopulation comes to mind. I've nothing to offer but words and love. It's not enough to nudge your attention loose like bits of lunch you toothpick from your nails. My boring presence is some kind of strange vitamin, apparently, as you apply the skills of a surgeon to your perionychial probings. You must be a strange vitamin for me. You're all I can see, as I look right through people smiling at me.

What it takes to win me over? From you, anything can. An e-mail about a rooster's wingspan. An impression of the Elephant Man. A bumper sticker joke you saw on a sedan. The percussion of banging pans. I might be too easily won over, but who cares, let's share a romp in the clover. Meeting you was like getting tied up and covered in a velvet blindfold, tossed in the back of a van. You scared me, but soon the gasoline fumes and sounds of traffic made me happy. Then you let me out and we walked in the sun.

An empty heart is the devil's hot tub. So it is with you. Your barren oaken shores are filled with my blood, not yours.

You bought me from the gypsy selling kids like bootleg movies. He was discreet, felt out his customers, skilled at sniffing out cops. There was no whiff of morals on you. You won't let me eat unless I cut myself first. You save the blood and feed off my youth. It's surpising what one can grow used to; I'm living testament to that. The pain's still there. I no longer struggle, too worn down to fear.

You flip through Amanda's silly magazines, waiting for her to get off the phone. She's getting details for the party tonight; you promised you'd go with. You're putting off getting ready, smothering anxiety butterflies with exaggerated nonchalance.

"John's gonna be there?" she says into the phone. "When did he get back in town?"

Suddenly you want more time to get ready. You don't get up just yet.

"Oh, and his friends from work, too?"

Suddenly you wonder if you should shave. You shoot Amanda a quizzical look, your conundrum gesticulated by razoring movements over your leg. Her grin says yes.

I wore my hair in a French twist. I worried it was a little too fussy, that you'd think I was trying too hard. I hate to admit it, but an ambiguous word or wrinkled glance from you can pop all my purchased self esteem like a soap bubble. God help me, I wouldn't find you so exciting otherwise.

We went to an art theater and saw "Alphaville" We had such impassioned conversation afterward, a sense of "us against them" cocooning us in collusion. Later, we had amazing, fireworks sex. I can still smell the sulphur fingers in the air.

Your words are embezzled beelzebubs, ideas from a foreign land that you've twisted to your own end. Your kiss is loaded, you slip me a razor under my tongue that I'm to keep secret 'til I need it. Everything we do has an urgency that's bigger than you and me. We are not just man and woman but allies, in service of a greater good.

Or so you said. I was eager to believe as I'm spiritually homeless. You sensed that and that's why you chose me. You probably even know I see through you and won't leave you anyway.

One of my few prized possessions is the doll you gave me with the clockwork heart. There were dials in her back that you wound up to set an alarm. At the appointed time, this big metal heart in her chest would pop open like a locket and she'd hold out her arms and sing this good morning song. For a snooze alarm you pushed down her head, a feature which endlessly cracked up any boyfriend who saw it. The jerkier ones would ask me for a "good morning song." The nicer ones laughed shyly. It's broken, of course.

"There are ramifications to flitting about like a feather and following whatever tickles your fancy."

Your mother's words burned in your skull and filled you with white hot shame. Being stuck with her disdain, you decided to use it as fuel. You shift in your seat on the Greyhound bus taking you away from her. A new city awaits you, a new relationship. You practice writing your first name next to the last name of the person waiting for you. "Hope is the refuge of the weak" is another thing your Mom said. Maybe, but without it, you'd be dead.

You don't like what I have to say. It's so obvious a kid watching you in a cartoon could tell by that bulging vein in your forehead. Since I know you well, I know the shiny things that will distract you. I whip out any trick I think will work, try to smooth you out before you really go berserk. It doesn't happen often, but it's ugly when it does. Knowing so much about things like this makes me feel hard-edged and glamorous, like my story could be set to song. It should just make me feel "this is wrong."

I enter your room tentatively. Mucusy napkins crunch underfoot like fall leaves. I shudder in revulsion and walk in exaggerated jump steps like a trigger happy cowboy's saying "dance! Dance!" When I find a clear patch of floor I say "So...Mom wants to know if you're coming down for dinner." You say you're not hungry, like I knew you would. I never pull the diva shit you do 'cuz no one would care. I resent being the messenger. Mom might as well have said "ask your pretty sister what size crown she'll need when she wins Miss America, OK?"

I see you. You laugh in that infuriating way - quiet enough so I'm not included but loud enough that I can hear. You play it off nonchalant, but I know it's intentional. Don't forget I know you and that hard look in your eyes, cold as a well stashin' a dead body. You been dippin' in perfidy and you wanna flaunt it in front of me. You toss me a handful of quiddities and claim that you've explained. You see me as an ever replenishing pantry; even kids who read comic books know "you wouldn't like me when I'm angry."

The cupboards were bare and we had time to spare. We challenged each other to make a banquet with what we could find. The best find stumbled on was a drink we called a Squid Nipple, Irish cream and clam juice. At first it was a dare; then we emptied both bottles. Our lives are woven with lots of happy accidents; our relationship began as one. Now we drink them all the time. Others like them, too. We can't tell if they really like them or just thirst for the alchemy that will make them happy as you and me.

"Welcome to Neverlights, love," the bartender says, wiping a glass. He has the impeccable manners of a kept man, someone who lives off his looks. He has a soft gleam in his eye that seems to say "you are the most beautiful woman I've ever seen...it is a privilege to stand before you." And yet...he looks like someone who'd work in a dump like this - old, fat, and balding, some neighborhood fixture who'd serve Archie Bunker a beer. You kind of love this guy. You spot Kenny on his barstool, nod at the bartender, make your way through.

The "charmingly candid" photos of you were all staged. At the beach house in pajamas, making breakfast in messy hair, grabby as newlyweds. At the carnival, eating churros, sugar smeared on your lips, holding a gigantic purple teddy bear (I think the caption for that one said "Ted better stay on his toes; Alice seems quite taken with this handsome charmer!"). You can't believe people fell for it. But how would they know otherwise? You're a minor celebrity, a forgettable trifle to them. Now that's what you are to yourself. You wait for Ted to get home from his date.

My preteen nights brought visions

fueled by lust and derision

of trouser snakes

to make me quake,

huge as Wonder Woman's lariot,

didn't know how guys could carry it,

much less how I'd bury it.



Junior high gossip

proved to be toxic.

When I saw one with my own eyes,

I acted surprised,

but I thought he was deformed

and he felt scorned.

I felt less scared...but fear was kinda hot.

What a drag to find what they really got.



But you, horny as a boy from Borstal

your tentacle

made me insensible,

speak in tongues like a Pentecostal.

It's telling that my most narcissistic possession only became so through association with you. I only think it's OK to admire myself with another's blessing and, on that day, your word was true. On a five dollar bill you wrote "Jessica, you're beautiful. I love you like fireworks. I'm a big jerk." You claimed not remembering it the next day. I'm used to only feeling loved when others aren't looking, feeding off scraps like a hungry ghost. When I got in a car accident you didn't visit me, but I clutched that bill like a talisman of hope, a rosary.

Your platitudinous attitude, it is

such a bore.

When you're not there I score

cheap laughs off repeating your words,

like a monkey throwing turds.

There are better ways to spend my time,

but I'm just recouping my loss

reclaiming myself as boss.



You're lovable like a bad movie

something I'd watch on Son of Svengoolie

Your faith in yourself, despite the facts

in person it does tax

At a distance, though?

It's a hell of a show.

Even the gypsy queen in a glaze of Vaseline

could not steal eyes from your scene

and everyone knows what I mean.

The sequins on her gown glitter like prairie night sky. If you lay on the ground and look at her from below, she appears as one with the inky heavens. Yet who wears sequined gowns in little cow towns? What's she doing here? She's following instructions she was told would conquer her fear. She's determined to be courageous, to conquer her triskaidekaphobia. She stands in the moonlight on the 13th day of the month, 13 years after her lover went away. This is the exact spot where she met him. Knowing she'd be here, you long to take his place.

You're cold as a sorbet grenade in the shade, smooth as a samurai shave. You look at me and see green grass to pave. You size me up as a potential slave. Lucky it was a fake number I gave...but I've got yours! You see women only as Madonnas or whores. I just want a little sugar in my bowl, not be cast in your Freudian role. They say bitches got problems? Yours are a full-time job, chum. Save it for someone who cares...which at this point is just your mirror stare and lovingly tended pubic hair.

Tempest in a clean twat, think you're manufacturing hot, show everyone what you've got. Before you sit down you gotta blot. Your art don't come out of a jot but a squat. 'Tis really the good Lord what made the stuff ya whored. Getting attention ain't hard with access to Daddy's credit card.

I shouldn't throw stones. For some, you may be the only answer to a jones. But me, I check the hour on my phone, nostalgic for a more solid time zone. You've got look-at-me-itis, sis...and there but for the grace of my goodbye kiss go I.

Princess Bubblegum Snatch,

your evil thoughts gestate,

just burstin' to hatch.

Silly confections slide over your tongue,

your eyes on the prize,

who you see is well hung.

You arch your back and blow a bubble,

the shortest distance 'tween you and trouble.

The fish are nibblin'

your prey now dribblin'.

You head to the ladies' room,

bidding him to follow you.

The stall door clicks,

he takes out his dick.

You're excited and slick.

Is it magic or sick

to rendezvous, fluorescent lit?

All you know is the wall's cold

and you feel split,

strangely purified by unambiguous spit.

I hear your name and it warms yet stings. Like an eloquent sunburn, something I wouldn't have unless I failed to follow good advice.

You touch my back, where my flesh is burn-red broken up by pale crosses where swimsuit straps were. You run your fingers over the white lines, eager to claim anything not yet yours, which don't add up to much, but you're in this to win. I wince and you grin. I tell myself I won't, but I let it begin. The next morning I'm on fire inside and out and reach out to an empty pillow.

The banner behind you said Trembling Tree, your band named for an herbal remedy, so called because its leaves could never rest, trembling for shame that poplar formed the cross that crucified our Lord. You come on with an ecclesiastical fervour; even the nonbelievers can't help but wonder what all the fuss is about. Your message may be unfamiliar but your spirit makes them jump and shout. They mirror your moves whether they mean to or not, the whole room shaking with demons and angels duking it out. It's me who wrote your lyrics but no one knows my name.