Poems - 3. Bell Pepper

I sit at a table with a tablecloth of hearts,
And put my hands on the tablecloth of hearts,
And notice that there are many colors
In the sticky soda-stained tablecloth of hearts,
And all the while I am saying in a voice of thunder,
Cracking plastic with my voice of thunder:
“DON’T YOU KNOW I SWING
THE OTHER WAY?” And this voice is so loud
It crashes out of my head and bolts to my hands
And spills my Coke all over my pants,
And the girl next door is asking in voice of sugar,
Wanting to know with her voice of sugar,
“Oh, can I help you clean?”
So I am sitting at the table of hearts
The color of spilled drinks and sticky napkins
And shish kabob peppers no one likes to eat,
And wondering if I’m allowed to wonder out loud,
As the girl next door is cleaning my pants,
If “SHE KNOWS WHAT A SLUT SHE’S BEING,”
And I think no one should mind if I wonder out loud,
While filching shish kabob hearts no one
Else likes to eat, that when I wonder out loud
Others should hear it, and not see only the tablecloth
With its colors of soda spills, but that heart
Of all hearts: the stubby, stabbed bell-pepper stem
And its heartbeat of thunder.