A Little Diversion (Poem for Beautiful Girl)

(People who post poetry on their blogs are lame.)


Fairfield Inn Room 346, Kansas City, Kansas

You are a goddess and a genius
i say to my friend she says to me
we will be princesses together
with yellow stones in your tiara and me with a green in mine
Victory Victoria Alexandria Albertine
your little sister shall be Albertine
and we will keep the good names.

You are an angel and a goddess my friend she says to me, she has created
me as Celestial, Celeste, Celesta (a tiny piano?
why not - i think it has the voice of angels, thin bells
arguing on high)
me as the heroin of my story
worth every penny for the high
dirty needles left in our wake
as she gets up from the dermabrasion table
(all reinvention comes from vanity)
and i lay down on the floor.

You are a genius and an angel
we say, we kiss hello, we rise from hell
oh, how we shriek with joy and share our scalps
and swap shampoo in tiny hotel bottles
that remind us of the nights
we spent and spooned, were chaperoned
and we were good little girls
good as gold, good as angels,
good as kind goddesses, not that other kind
of goddess, whose pretty words are sharp like knives
but not as sharp as scalpels - why make an easy wound?
we say, and laugh, receive our tributes
as our due, we pay our dues
with checks that bounce, and sign our names
Morgana, Calliope, Misti, Alice Pleasance
or just 'me', illegibly, i, i, i,
and tell our paramours to prove their love
and take the bait, slay the dragon, hold the line,
i'll be back, i promise, one day, i'll be back.