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When Ice is Alive

She got a rooster drunk
on Volk --on sale-- vodka
in a Muzak-fiddle elevator.
This made the other riders
knead their pasty faces
and get off sooner
than they ever wanted.
We were in Vegas,
so it made sense.

+

The syphilitics were marching
in bright costumes,
some dressed as Indians.
It was an annual event
in that desert town
gone empty as moonless night.
Baby and I bought pink
cotton candy and drank
way too much soda pop.
We skipped the postcards.
This was her way
to end whatever it was
we were doing to each other.

=

Would you care for
a marzipan skull?
Would you like
my bare skin
in a gingerbread house?
We were in that half-store
for See's chocolates
in High-hat City.
She had questions
on those dark streets...
as if she was a sentimentalist
and I was still enthralled.
I was riding for a wilder
discovery than the wolf-child
she wanted me to see in her.

©Red Shuttleworth