I love Bambi
when a hunter shoots Bambi’s mother
I hide under the seat until the movie ends
My mother holds me
whispers she’ll never leave
I don’t know that love is my mother
I only know her perfume her red lips her cigarettes
are my home
I am in love with Ricky Nelson’s white teeth
Dion’s Bronx accent Chubby Checker’s twist
Ponderosa’s Little Joe my mother calls me Boy Crazy
When the Beatles come they conquer my American heart
I shut my mother out
finger-love the Fab Four in my princess bed
A boy from the city moves into my neighborhood
we cut high school he shows me how to roll a joint
gives me my first hickey
My mother says he’ll take his Kennedy good looks elsewhere
she’s right my broken heart morphs into mono
mom calls me a slut with the kissing disease
I lose a school year and stay in bed with Joni Mitchell
I meet my husband in college
he never loved himself so how could he love me?
My daughter wants me to find love
signs me up on Jdate Match Christianmingle
gives me some blue pills in the event I find a senior with a tingle
My Catholic friend has left her family
grows garlic and lives a contemplative life
she is in love with Jesus
I think I could fall for the Pope
he wouldn’t judge my love handles
but I think he is in love with God
My daughter is afraid I will die alone
she thinks she knows what love is
Vicki Iorio is the author of the poetry collection, Poems from the Dirty Couch (Local Gems Press, 2013). Iorio’s work in various on line and print publications such as Hell strung and Crooked (Uphook Press, 2010), The Brownstone Poets Anthology,The San Pedro Review, I Let Go of the Stars in My Hand, Crack the Spine, Mom Egg Review. Her chapbook Send Me a Letter will be published by dancing girl press this spring. You can see Iorio perform at open mics in and around New York City.