Thinking to Myself Post-Op at Fathers Bedside
Ava C. Cipri
I want to know why
you identify with Bruce Springsteens The Streets of Philadelphia
& U2s Where the Streets Have No Name.
The roads we crossed, traveled,
lived on, & abandoned.
Our heads always turning back in their direction.
Theres so much to say … Im happiest when Im a king dancing
in drag as Bruce Springsteen, Michael Hutchence, & Prince.
I want to tell you that I love Rita Hayworth, but no,
I love her the way you loved her.
How to tell you this …
the most erotic striptease can be a woman
removing only her gloves, a woman
who stands reading in the library stacks,
and like Hayworths Gilda, I remember, it was all in her eyes.
Its safe to love her because she is dead.
I want to say, here, here is my lover …
who introduced me to PJ Harvey,
that I shopped with in the Gaps mens department.
Here is the lover I first partnered with in ballet
to Balanchines Jewels, & her, I.
Here is the lover that left me
when the biopsy came back, before the surgery.
Here is the lover whose hand I held
crossing Charles Bridge in Prague.
Here, all these women you never met,
are part of me, & I never gave you the chance.
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