I want you to beg for me to take you back so I can be
as cruel as you were to me
and say in dulcet tones
A whisper:
"No."

I tried to drown the thoughts of him in the strongest drink, but they are unaffected
and have learned to swim.

My old great-aunt Elaine with her withered hands gave me $200 and beaded handbag
"This your mad money," she told me, as we sat on that nursing home couch, "And it ain't for your purse. This goes in your shirt, where only you know you got it."
The assisted-living nurse chuckled to herself. They got along, my great-aunt and her.
"Why?"
"Cuz if you get angry," she said, in that Marlboro-raspy voice of hers, "And you gotta go, you walk out on your date and you leave 'is ***. And then you got your money for a strong drink. And your cab."
The nurse laughed
My aunt re-situated herself on the nursing home couch. Elaine Dauterive. Her mind was going, and so was her health, but she was as regal as a queen on her throne in that moment
her fire-red hair, ungrayed, was her crown
No cape as royal as that sleeping gown.
"Don't you think for once second I can't take care of you, honey," she said in that creole drawl, and I knew what she meant
Because even after she'd gone I would have that mad money
All stuffed in my bra for when I needed it
Because she was older than time, for me, seeing things like
The Great Depression, World War II
What I read in history books
I'd be ****** if I took what she said with even one grain of salt because Auntie-Lane, I'll be ****** if I don't love you
And I know you're on your way out and
I'll buy you whiskey in the afterlife with some of that $200 cash that you busted your *** scrounging up for me
Southern hospitality at its finest
And those liver spots redder than wine adorn you like badges of honor for all of the years you've endured
My elder - creole woman, with a soul as fire-red as her hair, breathing more smoke than air
My old dragon
On a pile of gold: her mad money

when you say "no" and he says "please" SAY IT LOUDER
when you say "drive me home" and he says "five minutes" SAY IT AGAIN
when you say "no" and he says "just once" LEAVE
when you say "no" and he says "nobody has to know" SAY GO **** YOURSELF
when you say "no" and he says "but i bought you dinner" GET OUT OF THE CAR
when you say "no" and he says "yes" SAY NO

when you say no, SAY IT LOUDER, SAY IT AGAIN, LEAVE, GO **** YOURSELF, GET OUT OF THE CAR, NO

No.

I keep thinking about this beautiful girl from the mental hospital. Her name was Carion, and she didn't exist.
She had lived her entire life without a social security number, no blood type or birth certificate to define her
and the walls of Calhoun couldn't confine her because she would
Carry On - that's how I spelled it in my head.
I know her name was only one 'r' from being the word for dead animals, but it never registered for me.
She was no corpse for vultures or hounds, but they stalked her anyway,
her demons were hyenas lurking in shadows but her
round eyes were bright and she told me I was pretty and that, later, she'd flirt with me if it weren't against the rules.
I wanted to flirt with her, too. Make that brown bark flesh all flushed with a blush from the way we whispered sweet nothings with voices all hushed.
Oh, Carry-On.
Those blue hospital gowns wrapped around you, on that dark skin like the way a robins-egg hue clashed with the branches of a nest.
I remember how we sat with the same pain in our chests.  
I hope she's ok.
I hope she's still carrying on in the same way she did in that horrible place.

I think I hate myself more than you could ever love me

I have broken every rule with you
For we have not kept our hands (or our hearts) to ourselves