Imagining the Mews (Commercial St., Provincetown, MA)

& as everywhere else there are more

guitar cases than briefcases though

Mr.12-String in a pink headscarf stands out.

I'm sensitive where I am, know the red-head

with bicep tattoos is not interested

that her poems about butterflies & kittens
are metaphors crushed under work boots.

Of course there are songs about love
& 2 different guys sing Judy Garland

& there are pop tunes I just don't know.

Another poet reads from a marble composition

book, all teenage angst & outrage.

I'm wondering if the cute bartender
with the pink thong & vague tattooes

flowers & vines on the inside of her breast

will ever come back to refill my beer

when the host calls my name & I don't know
what to read, realize I'm too heterosexual
for this bar, these singles, this clientele
but read my poems about cougars & pussy
anyways, & they all clap (they always do).

I buy the red-head a drink after all
& it turns out she is the bartender's girlfriend.
Nobody buys a book, but then they never do.