Diary Entry of a Webcam Girl

Panties draped over my lamp, my bed and laptop.
My clients favor my red corset.
If you have a valid credit card, you can see me in ways
only the bathroom mirror does early in the morning.
They like it when I keep my window open, so many
of them have voyeuristic fantasies.
Sometimes, my neighbors pass by while I work, but
they haven’t even taken a peek.
(At least I hope they haven’t)
I have one neighbor though, who smiles at me when
I leave my apartment. He sweeps his porch even if
it’s clean. I wonder if he’s seen my show?
I know other college girls who work at strip clubs and
must face their client’s erections and hear their cat calls.
I read on a screen what they’re afraid to say to
women in person. They ask me to choke myself,
stick a cellphone into my vagina and tell me
I remind them of their daughter.

The Green Flashlight

I’m not so sure I get
all this hubbub about
a man becoming a woman.

We crave that.
We always have.
Uncle Mildred enters and the crowd goes wild.

Explain what makes
an eyelash “false.”
Consider the streets of Bangkok.

To illustrate my point, last basketball season,
the fellas and I would get together
after each game to try on makeup.

We would take turns wearing my mother’s
Japanese geisha robe in the dark and singing
“Lady Stardust” into the green flashlight.

It was a great way to unwind
after playing so
aggressively.

Some of us still pass around
the green flashlight
as needed.

Some of us glow
green from deep
within.

Can’t Stop

we made blood angels
on the linoleum

usually
when we cut each other
it’s contained

but tonight
we got drunk
and did some other stuff
and one thing
led to another

and now we’re bleeding
all over the place

laughing

crying

aww, it feels so good

“ok we should stop now”
I say

she jokes
“i don’t think I can stop”

I joke back
“haha me either”

she says
“i wasn’t joking”

I say
“what?
you don’t really want to die
do you?”

Investing in the Future

“Small donation to
the beer foundation?”
asked the haggardly
handsome man,
raising his empty
as I passed him
on the street.

I flipped that fella
an entire Euro,

fearing it
might one day
bear returns.

The Laughing Man

I see a man
bent slightly forward
hands in face
as if he is putting on a mask
He sobs
the only way
a man who wears boots and cream shorts
can screams with misery
then he takes his hands from his face
he starts to laugh
and his face changes
then he looks at me
and laughs even louder

New Faces

I had an idea
for making love to the same woman
less boring
I would put a screen over their face
and you could pick anybody you wanted
I wouldn’t pick a supermodel though
I would go for the lowest dirtiest slut
I could think of
loads of makeup
smelly
the lower the better
I have never found a woman
low enough yet
but there is still time

Big Shot

I spent 5 years
submitting
to every petty poetry rag
under the sun

Every online
wank fest you could
imagine

I groveled,

Sucked dick
for mic time,

Read to rooms
with an audience of
two

(Them two people
were other feature poets
waiting to read their shit)

I begged my friends to come
to my shows

I self published

I rotted my
bones with
a desperate
ink.

Then

After a few good years
being published
interviewed
and
getting paid

People
started to hassle me
for poems

Baby, You Know I Like To Be

bossed around in the sack, but don’t you dare
try telling me what to do anywhere else.
You do what you need to do,
and I’ll do the same.
My pussy is yours
when I say you can have some; otherwise
she belongs to me, and if she craves
a vacation with 2 or 3 different men,
it won’t mean
there’s any less for you.
You vacation on your own,
and I promise not to say a thing.
Possession is a dirty word,
a drug-related offense, and it offends me
when someone tries to put
a studded collar on me, cause I ain’t no bitch.
I’m a sucker for a bad boy
who drinks and swears too much, and I can deal
with all kinds of trouble.
But no yelling matches, and no crying
about how you can’t live without me
because you know damn well
I’m not your heartbeat
and certainly not your lungs
filling up as you sleep.
You’re not my man,

and I’m not your woman
unless I’m coming, dripping
my stuff all over you,
leaving rifts in the skin of your back
like a lioness scores the trunk of a tree
when she’s heated.
What I’m saying is
I love you
like a good woman should,
like a bright moon on a dark night
spotlighting you home
after the applause has died down,
so just appreciate me
while I’m here, knowing that
even when I disappear,
I always come back for more.