It's Mine, So I Borrowed It:

Babe, do I know you?

do your kisses tingle like champagne?

got some love left for me?

dragging her hips

stirring the stew

walking past the gin and cigars

past beat up hearts

come in babe

do I know you?

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He liked the licorice cigars. He lit them at a wooden table next to the jukebox, kicking his work boots on the chair. With coke in his blood and long-ago Vietnam in his heart he spit anger at the world. I was with him for years for the price of a few drinks and a motorcycle.

You collect strays, his friend had said to me.

Years later after his laugh was gone and the ground took him back, another friend asked me, why aren't you married? Let's be honest, you're almost 40 and you're a nice looking girl…

I said, I just never saw it that way.

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The words are making me angry, hiding their beautiful lilts and whorls.