Iraq is for lovers (2003 remix)
W and his daddy issues ended two affairs
I enjoyed that winter the crows left
butterscotch wrappers and ribbed condoms
on my back stoop both officers used
to enter me
into a database
tracking men who told
when asked top or bottom
age weight race height build hung
algorithms and servers humming
deep in the mountains I cruised
before the internet acronyms fell
like Baghdad and my missionary
was accomplished by Sunday brunch
THe other cheek
My husbands Bo and Tom don’t see me
in the backyard. They’re busy
plating endive-bedded broccoli rabe
sprinkled with red pepper and something soyish
per the photos in our Loverboys group text.
Tom used to love us with buttered medium rares—
our Y2K riverfront condo era, Bo always shaking
vodka martinis opaque enough to hide
the future from our marathon-trained hearts.
Had you asked me to predict this
present domesticity, I would’ve
turned the other cheek—
as in my ass, lubed
and playing peekaboo
in the Pipeline’s crowded basement
as wild as the world that said I shouldn’t be
myself or marry a man, let alone two,
our guest fourth driving in tomorrow
for his monthly long weekend
of me watching, mostly.
They don’t see me
watching them swirl glasses of red wine,
delaying my reentry to the new queer geometry
of our house—I’m the oldest square
in our comfortable sphere and I wish
I were still a circle jerk superstar.
I wish we still lived in that condo
where the maintenance man serviced
residents in the freight elevator. I wish
they didn’t look so happy without me—
Tom kissing Bo after they toast
to what I’m not sure I want to
know anymore. Every Friday
it’s my turn to mow.
Hailing from the farmland valleys of west Appalachia, Ben Kline (he/him/his) lives in Cincinnati, Ohio. Author of Sagittarius A*, Dead Uncles, and the forthcoming It Was Never Supposed to Be, Ben is a storyteller, poet and Madonna megafan. His work appears in Poet Lore, DIAGRAM, Copper Nickel, MAYDAY, Florida Review, Bellingham Review, Gordon Square Review, POETRY, South Carolina Review and many other publications. Learn more about his work at https://benklineonline.wordpress.com/.