by Genevieve Greinetz
Um yes it’s possible to fall in love in three sentences
in line for the bathroom at Manny’s, full bladder
rearing to go you do selfless things like let the star of the show
cut you in line, it was Alex Edelman. He was crazed & jogging
on stage but in line he was a white deer, i know
because in 1949 Charles Howard bought 53 albino deer
ten bucks a pop & released them to kill for fun
near Point Reyes, but some survived & i pulled up
a few years ago to a lot in Olema – saw the moon thing
glowing elk reindeer just standing there in my headlights like Alex Edelman
blinking at me sweet in line & i said you should definitely cut me, so he said couldn’t possibly
so i said go on & he went since it was 5:30 & the thing was starting
at 5:30 but probably 5:29 i built a house in his dewy gaze & by 5:30
we’d lived our whole lives together in it – real true
love, always for me. I’d say it’s my problem but this French philosopher
Gabriel Marcel, says swap “mystery” for “problem,” see
what happens. It’s my mystery. It is. I’ve got this guy in LA
writes me vignettes on God & we talk
sometimes his hair is worth living for. Or what about that director
in New York i met in silence, my boyfriend
in Berkeley, super weird but intriguing in this Neptune type
of way. Did you ever hear “Dirty Girl” that FELT song
where Murs and Slug sing verse for verse about girl after girl?
There really aren’t enough stanzas like that in women’s poetry
& i’m making up for it – call it Dirty Boy
i’ll go on & on about all my mysteries.
Genevieve Greinetz is a San Francisco based poet who lives near the sea. Her poems appear in NELLE, Honey Literary, NomadArtx, Jokes Literary, and Pink Disco, among other publications. Genevieve’s first full length collection is forthcoming in 2025.