The rest of these poems are from the two collections
of mine forthcoming: To the Quick,
which comes out next month.
And a collection called Shades, which will
be coming out in February, '88.
This first couple or so are not for KXCI and the FCC.
You might want to cover your children's ears.
I Knew I'd Sing.
A few sashay, a few finagle.
Some make whoopee, some make good, but most
make diddly squat.
I tell you, this is what I love about America.
The words it puts in my mouth, the mouth where once my mother
rubbed a word away with soap.
The word was cunt.
She stuck that great big bar in there
until there was no hole to speak of.
So she hoped.
But still I'm full of it: the cunt, the prick, short you,
short I. The words for her and him.
I love the things they must have done, the love they must have
made to make an example of me.
And after my lunch of ivory, I said vagina for a day or two,
but knew from that day forth which word
struck home with more the force of sex itself.
I knew when I was big, I'd sing a song in praise of cunt.
I'd want to keep my word, the one with teeth in it.
Even after I was raised, I swore nothing but nothing
would be beneath me.
Not like the Victorian era when, as mom said,
asterisks were followed after a certain interval by a baby.