SO MUCH MORE
Love is not best expressed
through sex, yet sex sells
on the squawk box. From
VH1 videos to BET, you
can bet our youth are so
deprived of anything more
thank the depravity of the
booty call. Of women as
moving, bump and grinding
blow-up dolls. Of men with
faces only a mother could
love, whether country stars
(ten-gallon disguising their
hair plugs and plaiding their
paunches), Promise Keeping
Brothers who still leer at
the camera, or rappers who
pull teeth in favor of diamond
implants. These images imbed
like a cancer; only one answer:
The parental counter-punch.
Demonstrating healthy, loving
relationships. Turn off the
TV and unplug the modem;
talk about what lies beyond
the birds and the bees. Soul.
Spiritual bonding. Looking
your partner in the eye, not
sneaking peeks at anatomy.
Friendship first; hormones in
harness; self-esteem before
chasing the false, fleeting
dreams of sexy steam.
Warning! This is about condoms and sexual responsibility and the futility of abstinence education!! Hey, I tell the girls, “No umbrella, no singin’ in the rain!”
CONTAIN YOUR EXCITEMENT, GUYS
In this age of The Pill
Please remember, the thrill
isn’t all it is cracked up to be
While you scope out the cuties
Do be mindful that cooties
will be waiting if you’re condom-free
There are Abstinence teachers
and well-meaning preachers
who will tell you to marry ‘fore “sailin'”
If you take my advice,
you will think once or twice
about abstinence and Bristol Palin.
It’s not only the babies
but some toxic “maybes”
passed on through that condom-free sex
HPV, Herpes, AIDS
the Incurable Shades
will haunt all who do not “man up,” Tex.
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Our word at Sunday Scribblings this week was CURIOUS.
CURIOUS GEORGETTE
She trudged through our high school halls, lost
Aimless, claiming no one as her love,
let alone as her friend.
Defenselessness, defensiveness, born of low self-esteem…
Her mirror reflected no redeeming qualities – only questions.
She never knew we admired her aloofness.
It seemed like proof that you could survive high school
without a claque to back your every utterance
Graduation for Georgette was a slam of her parents’ back door
and a bus to the Left Coast.
The most she could score was a waitress gig,
but the tips were sometimes rolled in papers
or powdered, in neatly folded, palmable packets.
This was bliss. The otherworldly state, what was missing.
Communal living, easy giving
A belonging, a sense of family at last.
She offered her body to many men and
contracted various venereal diseases.
Still, she was pleased that she was wanted (though warted).
Dabbling in acid: Placid conversations with river frogs.
She produced artwork – optical delusions infused with
confused contortions of her new reality.
The hissing kiss of hashish in a hookah led to opiates of a wide variety,
side-winding her to limited life choices.
Not heeding her inner voice
(with its annoying mantra: “CAUTION!”),
she finally gave way to the needle.
Super Georgette, the heroin of her own life story.
Curiouser and curiouser.
Down the hold, harasses by nasty queens (and other tarts)
who wanted their money, honey.
Mad slatterns offered a spot in their stables,
and she complied… lied to her parents when she’d call for money
“I’m behind in my rent”
(I make rent using my behind)
smaller and smaller georgette shrank
until one day, shanked and shriveled,
she ceased to be at twenty-three.
Curiosity killed the kitten.
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
The prompt at We Write Poems was Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow. Bleak but possible. Amy
AND SO IT ENDS
Yesterday
the flash filled the evening sky
blinding us at first
A fireball, unearthly and
something told me to hold my breath as long as I could
Then came strong hot winds from the North
and with it, ash, falling slower than snow
suspended in deathly calm air
the stillness, the dreamlike atmosphere
Today we’re still waiting for Mom and Dad to
come home from work
The generator is working but we’ll need fuel
Tommy said Let’s see what’s up in town
People were stealing stuff from the store
No one was at the checkout so we came away with
cans of fruit and Spaghettios, juice, milk
some eggs that weren’t smashed in the carton
The ice cream melted overnight
We drank it out of the carton
and chugged warm soda trudging back home
through sifting ash in the middle of the street
Tomorrow I pray I wake up
and it will all be a bad dream
But Tommy and Sandy are counting on me
til our folks get home
Sandy cried tonight because SpongeBob wasn’t on TV
(nothing was on TV, I checked)
Tommy hauls out board games we haven’t played
since we got the X-Box
We roll the dice
and wait
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
TAKING IT WITH THEM
The girls are taking it with them
The secret shame, the reasons why
The scattered scars of late-night carving
The feeling fat starved unpopular neglected
Unprotected sex with unworthy boys
One took the bun and the oven too
They’ve left it all behind
School, grades, finals, college apps
Took off debt-free; no degree, no debris
No suitcases or makeup bags
No books or beanie babies collected at the mall
perhaps on weekends when they still hung with girlfriends
The farm is minus one pair of helping hands
And the family room, one less Bills fan
The market, one less cashier
The camp, one less counselor
Their school stripped their lockers of all reminders
and called in counselors because
Two girls left our town forever this month
No notes, no clues, no cries for help, no cues
Each in her own way on a different day, in a different way
Finally having their say: This is my life and I’ll do what I want
And that they did – one with drugs, one with a rope out back
They’re gone and they took it all with them
© 2010 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil
Sharp Little Pencil 