More escorting-related political poetry!

Yay!

I think the word for how I felt after writing this one was 'ecstatic.' Especially since I now know that my poetry professor loves my work, including the escort poems, and that this one, as it does not have a formal stanza scheme, cannot be this week's poem, must be for the final project.

Here goes:

The Fruit of my Labors
As we sat on that metal picnic table
I explained my novel's plot, explained Patrice, daughter of
the crazy protesters, "but she turns out okay."
"Most daughters do," you told me.
I raised my eyebrows, pointed to myself.
"Yeah, I was raised by conservatives," I said.
As if my parents were wolves and I was
Mowgli. And I knew you were a
third-generation Communist Jew.
"So what led you to changing?" you asked.

And I looked at you, beautiful springy-haired stranger,
and peeled open my life: my acceptance
of the wonders of Communism at age sixteen
while dating a working-class boy, while exposed
to my parents' classism, while I sat
in History class, not quite believing that the system which
rejected my sister for her gender could be so beautiful,
learning that someone always managed to screw it up.

Cracking open the skin, I remembered senior year
and the five-question political quiz with its result of
"liberal/libertarian" and how I had to choose the latter option
or else my mother might've killed me, but how
even 'libertarian' meant I was moderate, not
as right-wing as them. Because I believed in
gay rights, women's rights, and I was still
anti-racist, anti-classist. But they couldn't be totally
wrong, right?

Wrong. I revealed the juicy seeds: the Plain Dealer
was good. Universal health care
benefited poor people. Ken Blackwell was an asshole.
And as my parents worked for his campaign,
I studied women's history,
awoke to being pro-choice, and voted for
Ted Strickland, Sherrod Brown, and Stephanie Tubbs-Jones.

Protested the war, pro-life day, and rape.
Worked for the Obama campaign.
And then ate from your pomegranate
while sitting outside of an abortion clinic
ready to talk over the conservative Christian hordes.

(November 18th, 2008)

So if it's not completely obvious, yes, I did work with a very awesome fellow escort on Saturday, and we did talk. A lot. And this is basically the chronicle of one of our conversations, and anything after the "peeled open my life" line is something I said, as well as thought. And it was good.

And yeah, he'll be one more person in my life who I met, found to be awesome, and do not want to "get away."