*valet*

When the cars
come I get in them. People
leave’m here with me, empty
except for smoke or makeup, a
vulva aroma streaked
from hood to tail,
trunk to wind

shield the cars from harm.
Align, order, delineate, and
shine, buff, or wax
no charge. Take your time,
enjoy it.
Against the wall, cars
execution style

by numbers. Check plates and enter data,
vanity first and state decree
second.
Then bend like a deck hand and
pop the lid off the
suit and spray

your stink across the headlights
like cats in heat, like
shoes over power lines,
and wait for them to return
with pitchforks and torches,
sticks, Horses, liver and onions.

Fend them off, hoodlums,
scarred and sniffling.
Fist pounding chest and chest pounding fist
stave off the danger, bled
dry for principles, honor and reason

That is, someone else’s car

And that’s what we die for.