I asked a woman to change her curls to forever straight,
and offered $50,000

(a sum on my mind that day after a
particularly rough day trading),
incentive
to maintain said style in
eternal perpetuity

she has accomodated me now for over a decade+, but
every every, every now
and every then, She pulls me
closer than close,
whispers 50K~ok!,
and hits me with a
hockey checking
an enforcer's hip swaying
pow,
that be
her physio~verbal
hockey stick reminder,
that poets must always pay their debts,
and even
forever, eternal and perpetuity
are included!
&
have no legal  limitations
or
poetic exemptions

nor,
credit,
for time
served
🥴

The number of noise complaints in the City of New York exceeded 750,000.
<•>

that
does not
of course
include the
shrieks and screams of the
unfriended,, unloved, overwhelmed sad l~one~lys
that have the courtesy
uncommon
to add their cries of the heart
that are best stated, sung & satiated & even sated
ever so
s i l e n t l y

but their trembling tears

!howl!

I hardly think about you
Except when the music plays
And I realize that no one else
In the whole wide world
Knows the lyrics
But us...