SWWIM sustains and celebrates women poets by connecting creatives across generations and by curating a living archive of contemporary poetry, while solidifying Miami as a nexus for the literary arts.

"Escort" is her word &

the whole interview’s about her girl.

D says, I wanted her to know
but know my way,

not at school or from some jerk.
So one day I say, “We should talk,” & she’s freaked.

We sit down in the kitchen &
she starts crying. (So I’m thinking, She knows…)

“You got Cancer!
You got Cancer!” she starts screaming.

D snorts, We laugh about it now.
How she was so relieved
I wasn’t
dying.

*

Others in town talk
about D’s son

finding her nude online, or
fellow yacht-clubbers finding her & showing him
her webcam antics, her customer ratings
on her “Escort” ads.

My son was bound,
says D, 
to notice

my overnight bag. I stuffed it
with lingerie.
I mean—
jeez…

she shrugs.

There’s a bit of dead
air for the boy, then
he’s gone

from the interview.
 

                *


D scans the Starbucks
where we perch on stools. Says she’s failed
the bar exam a lot, her ex is a nerd, that she wants another degree
& to write a memoir,
But I’m so exhausted!

Then it’s back to her girl, When I take my girl
on errands, I point out

all the jerks in town who’re clients &
we laugh. An orgasm
is like a pedicure for these guys.
I mean—jeez…

Who does that?

she shakes out her long, frosted hair. She’s fifty-three
so she’s got some grey
but it looks classy.

I wonder if she’ll start pointing.

                *

Instead, D looks back at me, One time we saw

this big ass politico I’ve known for years
slurping pancakes with his wife, at IHOP.

She says his name
& I’m ready to stop the recorder.

Too funny, she sighs. She’s so 

far away she squints
at me, says, My girl’s cool. I nod.
We talk about all our guys.
It’s all good.

                *

Just wish there wasn’t

side effects
.
She leans away but we’re closer now—like mother,
like daughter. & the monied men in Starbucks seem to be
closing in as the place crowds, but

I’m hooked. Side effects?

I feel nothing. Like that song!
After nine years of this, she sings, I feel nothing
nothing nothing at all…


Jennifer Jean's debut poetry collection is The Fool (Big Table); her awards include a 2020 Kenyon Review Writers Workshop Fellowship; a 2018 Disquiet FLAD Fellowship; a 2017 “Her Story Is” Residency—where she worked with Iraqi women artists in Dubai; and, a 2013 Ambassador for Peace Award for her activism in the arts. Jennifer’s poems and co-translations have appeared in: Poetry Magazine, Rattle Magazine, Waxwing Journal, Crab Creek Review, The Common, and more. She’s the director of Free2Write Poetry Workshops for Trauma Survivors and an editor at Talking Writing Magazine. For more info, visit: http://www.jenniferjeanwriter.weebly.com 

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