Love is a gift for others. Give it away. Keep giving away your love. Empty yourself. Give until it hurts. Give everything you have and hope against hope it’s returned. There are no guarantees in this world. It’s dog eat dog. Midwestern politeness missiles drop on the unloved. Give up, give in, give, give, give a little… there it is! Buy low, sell high! Sell it all, sell your love. Take a walk, walk a mile, same tomorrow as today. An apathetic scream is a whimper of a thing. “Sorry about your trauma.” It’s a useless sting, a scam, a burden: the gift of resilience, take some more. It’s the love some get when the dress won’t fit. The box is too small? Don’t complain. Never complain. You’re a champ, take your shots. Shoot the moon. The moon is a kiss, the kiss is a plank of wood. Would I? Don’t mind if I do. “He was nice before he died. Nice to me, not to you.” “I understand, Jerry, and I could cry.” “Everybody has to have a drink at midnight!” He was nice when he was sober. Love everyone, drain it all until you have nothing left over for yourself. They will sell it back to you. Just one to get a taste. You’re the greatest. Happy new you! “He was always nice to me.” “I’m not friends with drag queens.” I’m all used up. I might know how to recover from the shunning you’ll get when you have the audacity to be discriminated against on their time. First, they fire you out of a cannon, and you get to pray you land on land that has a friend to people like you. Second, there is no second, so it was the tragically hip; it was a vector, a sickness, an insecure need to seem “cool,” and now you see they’re made of ice. “They’ve always been nice to me.” I guess It’s only me then. I’ll smile when their hammer falls. My parents warned me. I don’t care. Why me? Why not? I’m a pebble thrown onto the surface of a lake, a throw that is sharp, and it goes straight into the dark, never to be touched again by another human hand. Time reverses, unfollow clicks, a change in the moon, uncovers new friends. The past comes to stare, slack-jawed, unsure what it can do to reclaim its whipping boy, whipping girl? Whipping thing, but you complain too much. She seemed nice to me, Midwest nice, southern hospitality, a hospital stay, a semester of drama club. If they remember me, they don’t remember what they did to me, and if reminded, just don’t. “Why are you like this? You need to learn how to love.”
Mystery Doll 