Froward.
I found the word highlighted in my Bible.
I remember liking how it rolled off my tongue.
And thinking about tongues,
all the women I loved over the years came to mind.
Red dresses dancing
between shots of rock gut
and sloppy bar bands.
Wayward.
Full of drunken sailor vocabulary,
fingernails like a feral cat.
All twist and spark.
Unruly.
Thunder in a miniskirt;
honey, where’d your panties go?
A grinning succubus.
Fire.
And the soul that flirted
with the night—
and every other bum in the joint.
I lived with them.
Helped out with their kids.
Drank myself through them.
Played strip poker on
nights ripped mad
by cockroaches
and Sinatra.
My way? Fucking A-right.
They were wayward trains
plagued by broken tracks.
And still, I loved them.
Cussing, spitting, rolling
through my nights.
Laughing
and fucking
and crying a lot.
Screaming, you bastard.
And then making up
over a bottle of Thunderbird.
They left traces of a wildfire
on everything they touched.
My heart, my mind,
my cock.
Even when they carried
that cheap cardboard suitcase
out the door,
or stayed long enough to
crack my solace,
I inhaled them
like cheap cigarettes.
Sometimes harsh,
always alive.
And somehow beautiful
in the hunger
they left behind.