First Date, and Still Very, Very Lonely

A pleasant, leather poison
is the trick to smelling
good to female saddles,

that is, saddles with a hole
and not a pommel. Remember
those? Gone the way

of Vestal virgins and tight,
white black holy hell and with it,
the lesbian Elysium of old.

I miss the idea of wives.
The loving circle.
But onward. Today

is a sacred day. A date day.
An exception to the usual
poor me, poor me!

I'm not poor and I'm not me.
I remember both
states as soon ago as last week.

But that's history.
This is different. At a party,
once, everyone was so careful

that only I cut my lip drinking
from the winterspring
a kind of cold, decorative trough

centerpiece we were all
drinking from. The idea is
you're like animals.

If you ask, about the cut, why me?
The answer is, of course me.
In what world ever possible not me?

I could admit that with open blood
running down my chin
like hyena butter or gasoline.

I was mortified, really lost.
After that I thought,
I have to meet someone.

Copyright © 2008 Brenda Shaughnessy All rights reserved
from Gulf Coast
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission