This is a love poem,
To the girl
Who asked me out in the fourth grade.
I’m sorry I didn’t know what to say.
I’m sorry I don’t remember your name,
It must have been something like Katrina or Kate,
And I’m sorry that even as nine year olds
All we were learning in school,
Besides how to tune a violin,
Was that in order to be a person
A real,
Living,
Validated person,
We’re required to define ourselves
And categorize ourselves and
We’re required to check the box saying
“My heart won’t start beating till I know what love is” and
By the time we’re in the fifth grade
We want to start growing up so badly
That we play pin your heart to the boy or girl sitting next to you
Thinking maybe it will start beating now
The only words ever coming out of
My mouth that grew up on chocolate milk and ice cream
Should be “I’m sorry”
And I am because
Nasty is the only adjective that
Fits what I see most days.
Yet, even though I believe that
98 percent of the people I meet are good
I’m also sure that 99 percent of their situations aren’t
Which makes me seem like a pessimist,
But is it better to hope entirely
For a world no one is changing?
This is to the girl across the street,
Whose older brother is always high,
And who, at age 14, has learned
The right way to ask for things
And can shape her eyes to con almost anyone out of
Anything she couldn’t win by
Stealing it in the first place.
I made you repeat
“I’ll stay away from drugs,
Ill run when they are in front of me”
Enough times to
Hope cautiously you’ll hear my voice in your head
The next time you want a drag
And Princess,
I know you lost your mom to
AIDS of all things,
But you are good
You are good
You are good
Of heart and mind and soul
And you’re not innocent, I know
But you’re good I promise.
I saw the boys whistle at you on the street
I saw your step bounce a little more
But you’re more than you’re culture gives you allowance to be.
And your stars aren’t the same as hers
Because you see them with bigger eyes
And you’ve got the means to touch them
Even with rippled fingerprints and
That scar on your left thumb.
Sorry for the profanities, mom,
But lately “f@#! this shit” and
“I love you Jesus”
Are the only phrases that make any sense together,
Because that girl I worked with last summer
Asked me honestly what I thought about stripping
And she wasn’t sure weather to be proud of her body
Or to be careful with it and
When you’re working more hours than the sun’s up,
In the middle of summer,
Half a grand a night looks like gold with your clothes on.
Mom, she wants to get through school
And mom, the rents due
And I’d be scared to leave him when he hit me, too
If it meant taking on the
Other half of the bills
And mom that 14 year old tested positive
For carrying a child of her own
When she should be taking tests on Geometry instead.
She looks like butterflies and tire swings
So how is she gonna support a life?
Mom, these are lives
And I’ve heard a person can die a million times but
These are
Real,
Authenticated,
Ongoing lives,
And what do I do when they die?
When they are dying everyday
From now until some saint comes down and
Scoops them up?
No,
I’m not a romantic,
But this is a love poem
For you
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