thursday afternoon i bought the shredder
set it proudly within arms reach, tested
its teeth on junkmail and bank statements


spent saturday morning
turning hundreds of pages of our love
into skinny strips of paper


piled them in the middle of the room, danced
through them, rolled in them like they were 
autumn leaves


left them until sunday to clean up.












well, let me tell you about my day


went to the market bought: asparagus, mushrooms, 
cherries, pain in the choclate, sweet peas smelling of beauty.


waiting to cross the street to catch my bus.  a big man, 
a big round man, a big big round round developmentally 
disabled gentleman asks for some change.  i decline
like all the others on the corner but at least i smile.
so he stands behind me and declares


you have big tits.  big tits.  big giant tits.  great big tits.


follows me chanting about my great big tits for a block,
accompanied by the sniggers of many a passerby.  


finally shake him when i turn the corner -- 
walk toward two very short middle-aged mexican men 
who take this opportunity to stare at my great big tits
while making loud and juicy kissy noises at me.












actually i don't really like this poem 
but someone else said they liked it and 
that person is really popular so i must be 
mistaken and i do in fact like this poem


even though it has daffodils in it 
and normally i don't like daffodils 
but she likes them and i like her and 
everyone else seems to like her at least
the people i like like her so i guess 
this time i will like daffodils too


and i don't care for the subject matter
but it seems to be quite fashionable and 
when he writes about it lots of other 
people write to him and about him and 
about his poems so i think maybe  
it's a poetically worthy topic after all


you know, i really like this poem, 
it has an air of freshness about it and there's
just a hint of controversy -- makes one think.
good job.








© 1997 
Katrina Craig