The snow
shoved off
by a plow
fills in the
ditch now,
over where I’d
seen a wild dog
sleeping for
weeks. On the
drive home the
night is dark like
sapphire because
it is winter, and
winter’s dark
is blue. I’ve
tried
to write
about my customers,
but I can’t do
that without
getting complicated
about the
matter—just what
the hell
kind of stripper
am I?—one fed
up with the
cliché
lifestyle? Is
that it?—or am I
the one with
a magazine at
the beach, fast
asleep on the
lounge chair?
I think
it’s suffice to say
you fuck a man
for money once
and you’ve written
every Goddamn
poem in the
world—if only
I wasn’t so
tired, maybe
I’d do something
like that. For now,
get me home,
back to town, to
bed, out of the
backwoods
where the dead
farms are all blue
with winter
silence. The
chain-link
fence goes
quiet off a dirt
road; when
headlights flare
in the rear-view,
that’s when the
metal cries.
That’s when the
screen doors
scream. I want
to be safe, I
want to be
in my sheets,
I want to be in
something
comfortable
and held,
purse full of
money thrown
on the floor
of the bathroom.