Thursday, March 27, 2025

The Girl Nicknamed Mouse

Yeah, you were 20, sitting on a bench
on a balmy Central Valley evening, breezes
puffing in from the Sacramento Delta.

You tell the girl nicknamed "Mouse"
"I love you" and she responds, "I like you."
She will go on to marry the guy

you work with in the dorm's cafeteria--he'll
become a surgeon. It's the way it works,
you realize. Have to move on.

She went to boarding school
with the daughter of the Philipinnes
dictator. You didn't. Anyway,

after the love-like exchange, she lights up
a Marlboro, you two have a nice chat, &
then you leave for your pot-washing shift.

hans ostrom 2025

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