She saw him on Carson and confessed
she was madly in love
with his tangled black hair,
liner traced eyes, and lips
brushed with the same Cherry Red
she wore to mass every Sunday.
He looked like a devil, and sang
like a saint, so I guess it’s no surprise
that a nice Catholic girl, raised
on fighting off sin, would fall hard
for a goth rocker who wrote
about Heaven and boys that don’t cry.
She hummed along to Love Cats
while she folded my father’s shorts,
swayed to Friday I’m in Love
as she vacuumed the floors.
She was scared to say the lyrics
out loud, sure that God would not approve.
Yet, on my sixteenth birthday, she bought
us tickets to The Cure’s concert at The Greek.
On the night of the show, she tucked
her crucifix under the collar of the leather jacket
she dug out of a box in the back of the garage,
spiked her hair to the sky, dusted her lids
with dark shadow, painted her mouth
blood red.
Under the stars, she belted Let’s Go to Bed,
and didn’t care if God
heard every god-damned word.