By Arielle Greenberg
I really want you the dad I’m babysitting for
to fuck me or rather to want to
bringing me home in your turquoise sports car
babysitting dad will you get me in trouble
give me a story I can tell an afterschool special
will you ruin me or at least want to
I am good this is a problem
I don’t ever stick my finger into my throat
I don’t smoke I get A’s I cheat a little
on tests here and there I’m supergood
with your kids help them pick up the
transformers and I didn’t watch your porn
though I took it out from the back
of the faux-wood entertainment center
put it carefully back drank two sips
of the red wine in the fridge then brushed
my teeth with your crest on my finger
there is nothing special about me
my goodness makes me plain and I don’t
even know the size of my body
or what space it’d fit into under what table
part of me burns and part of me clicks
I have sex in my jeans tightly I want you
to ruin me though I’m not sure I’m able
to be ruined and I’m not attracted to you
I’m just so in the crotch of what I want
Arielle Greenberg is co-author of Home/Birth: A Poemic, author of My Kafka Century, Given, and co-editor of three anthologies, including Gurlesque. She lives in Maine and teaches out of her home, in the Maine community, and in the Oregon State University-Cascades low residency MFA. She also writes a column on contemporary poetics for the American Poetry Review.
Issue 2 | Winter 2013
Come Find Me
Emily as a Mango Hitting the Ground