I'm going to read a poem that--
where is it?
That Raquel mentioned that is a true story.
When I was a younger poet, I had just graduated from my MFA
at NYU, and I fell in love with an older poet.
And this is the moment in that relationship
that I realized that I had made a mistake.
No regrets.
"Service."
Somewhere outside of Albuquerque,
I was all fed up with the stories
about your ex-girlfriend's Guess billboard in New York City.
And to make matters worse, I had to pee like a racehorse
or like a girl who'd had too much to drink
way too far from home.
You stopped at a friend's body shop
to talk about a buddy who was stuck someplace in Mexico.
You were talking, pulling strings,
and taking pulls of a brown bottle,
and no one told me where the restroom was.
So I walked back to where the hot rods were displayed
like dogs ready for a fight, baring their grills like teeth.
I was hungry.
The air smelled like hot gasoline
and that sweet carnation smell of oil and coolant.
A girl pit bull came and circled me as I circled the cars.
She sniffed my ankles like I was her kin
or on some kind of rescue mission.
You were still talking, not a glance
in the direction of me and the bitch
working our ways around the souped-up Corvettes
and the power tools.
The pit was glossy, well cared for, a queen of the car shop.
And when she widened her hind legs
and squatted to pee all over one of the car's dropped canvases,
I took it as a challenge.
That strong yellow streams seemed to be saying,
girl, no one's going to tell me when to take a leak,
when to bow down, when not to bite.
So, right then, in the dim lights of the strange garage,
I lifted my skirt and pissed like the hard bitch I was.
[LAUGHTER]
Always interesting when your parents get the book.
[LAUGHTER]
Little things that you've taken out, you can't razor blade out.
They'll notice.
Why does it go from page 64 to 67?
[LAUGHTER]