The Politics of Being With You

I’m not interested in the politics of being with you

I didn’t sign up for televised debates

rallies or speeches or opposing candi-

dates

are what I wanted

Discussions about Plutarch and

Emily Brontë

or The Divine Comedy by Dante

Not the whys and why nots

the maybes and what ifs

when we haven’t even tackled

the anatomy of this

this

This

whatever this is

because I’m sort of like a mistress

stealing tongue, teeth, lips, and kisses

from someone who’s married to themselves

yet you want to question me

like I’m guilty, guile, and on trail

but I don’t recollect us walking down the aisle

still, you want to check the numbers in my phone like an audit

but wait a minute, you never put a fucking ring on it

So what do you want from me?

To be thankful because you text every now and then

try to beg me into bed but um, remember, we’re just friends

I won’t spend my Saturdays and Sundays

suffocating in your sheets

then wonder what you’re doing for the rest of the week

because I’m not interested in the politics of being with you

I didn’t sign up for radio interviews

or press conferences broadcasted on Fox news

all I really wanted to do

was become better acquainted over tofu

maybe Thai, Italian or even Swiss fondue

I wanted to buy that red shirt because I know

you’d like the way it hugs my shoulders

but trying to sway you is like trying to move boulders

and yes, at one time your scent made me smolder

but now I’m getting colder and that red shirt

shivers into a shade of cerulean

and all I have left of us

is yesterday, remember when

being together meant just that

You

and

I

But now everything I say

is to defend myself

and everything you do

is so you can commend yourself

But I don’t care about some silly title

I don’t just want to be a boyfriend

for sake of the claim

just to have the name

so if we hate it and it ends

I can say I had you back then..

And I’m not sure what it is

maybe the words lodged

in your throat

are making you choke

better cough them up quick

I don’t know the heimlich

and I never really said it

but it’s not hard to decipher or connote

you know I’m not here to win the popular vote

so perhaps the chatter of

him, her, they, them and those two

have made you paranoid

and scattered your askew

point of view

But like I said before

and after this, I’m through..

I’m not interested

in the politics

of being

with you