[RCL]

So be it, Mikey!


The Vanity of Valentines

With crayons, he carefully crafted little hearts
and rhymes, but she refused his dinky cards.

The one with perfect Palmer Method strokes
evoked a tiny smile and big No thanks!

In flowing cursive lines at St. Jude’s High,
he wondered why she broke their date V’s day.

At Yale, his digitized ditties of lovers’ fables—
sweet tweets—made Rose call him predictable.

He turned to sonnets for their subtle nuances
as well-wrought urns, as glowing verbal icons,

and Skyped her Petrarch’s, Dante’s, Shakespeare’s songs.
His miming of these greats was rarely strong.

But Rose wed him. She bitched that he'd been wordy;
he could have had her just by talking dirty.