Loving & Lusting (In The City)

"Loving & Lusting (In The City)"
a collection of poems
by Jake Kilroy

AN EXCERPT:
"Her Mixtapes"
it might just be that the world is looking to hate jake kilroy.

She told me once that she set her stereo on fire and threw it out a car window.
And from that day forward, I promised to never made her another mix tape.

Two months later, she made me a mix tape.
That Christmas, I gave it to my grandmother to tape over for NPR.

On New Year's Eve, I kissed her.
And the next day, she set my heart on fire and threw me out a bedroom door.

A year later, she kissed me.
The next holiday, I made her a mix tape and broke her stunning heart.

On Palm Sunday, she left a mixtape in my mailbox.
But on Easter Sunday, I knifed a note to her door.

The note read, "Forget holidays, forget mixtapes and forget your lover."
She saw me the next day.

She yelled, "You're the only lover I've had for months."
I said, "I know, and I'm a bad person. I've been making mixtapes for others."

"Other women?"
"Well, men don't fall for my musical trickery."

A month later, she said, "Don't get drunk and kiss me on holidays."
I said, "Then it wouldn't be a holiday, would it?"

She was mine for roughly seven months after that.
Then I started writing her poetry.

She'll probably read this and throw up.
And if I captured it on a mixtape, I'd be more honest than the others.

For the record, I blew up my car radio once, back when I had nights to drive,
before the liquor store stops and late hours hook-up drops.

I pulled bikinis off swimmingly in pools and danced skirts off with hands,
all the while listening to a mixtape she made me some Thanksgiving.

But I've got no rapture to part with, no sainthood to ordain.
I've just got a car bench seat where I can drank whiskey sorrowfully.

And I always listen to her mixtapes.