i gave you a rhapsody while the shower head rained down. i was the discipline, innate, and the jazz ebbed and flowed, and even when i idled, it sounded good because i broke & crescendo'd in the way you didn't predict but craved. there is music in me, and a hunger for the new in you.

romance is laziness. i am guilty.

i brought you flowers, roses, orange & perfume, and this money, this ten-dollar bill in my wallet, and two singles for tip, found you a bouquet with baby's breath & a sprig of fern, wrapped in lace & plastic, on a grey day; signifies my true affection.

a boy rarely buys me flowers.

the last one who did, was years ago, some unseasonal tulips, which i loved, because i loved the mercantile & hybrid history of dual-toned, fringed tulips, not because i had much love for tulips, or the gesture of flowers as an indication for love. the dutch ex-pats had ambition & tenacity.

all true new yorkers are their protege. we are italian and jewish, & irish, & asiatic & ghetto. we are bread in the windows, and cobblestones covered over by asphalt & concrete, consistently pot-holing when the snows come. we salt our roads for efficiency. we destroy our streets, our tires, our boots & pretty shoes. we are used to frequent dissolves of beautiful structure; rebuild & repave come spring.

there is a new road, built over the old one, built over another one; layers & layers, and sometimes, in the dead of night, in summers, i want to lay down on 1st avenue, or broadway, and be so close to this city that holds us all up.

she asks me to come for a drink, which i'd rather not, because she is asking for something to ease her loneliness & ennui, but i come anyway. i order a drink and she orders a drink, and she makes talk with the men & the barkeeps who are also men, or children with the faces of men, and i let the ice melt. it gets late, and a pair of attractive bodies walk in, and they do the exchange of glances, because they are fool enough to knock for opportunity. if i were a man, they would leave me alone so that i could have my silence at the bar, but i am a young woman, and not repulsive, and not mean.

he drools out his resume, struggles for common ground, and i am uninterested & disinterested & politely listening so his friend can entertain my friend. i could be at home. i could be with a book that does not offend me with its shoddy nature in formula & algorithm. friday nights are for amateurs and i am happier on my fire escape with my guitar.

cavemen didn't go up to women with their skins of dead animals, and get laid, posturing.