Burn List
Inside the heart
of every teenage
girl burns a flame
that never goes out.
But virgin brains are
vigilantly branded. Better
to marry than to burn.
So I kept my lily hands off
the handsome Mormon
who took me to the carnival
in a cobalt sports car.
And with the blue-eyed blonde
from Prophetstown
I limited the penetration
to stares.
There was the vampire
I snogged on the dance floor,
and the journalist
I ardently groped
in the dark. But
any time I came
close, guilt and fear
doused the spark.
How far is too far?
Preachers are ever eager
to advise.
The Baptist missionary
repented of impure thoughts
inflicted by holding my hand.
While the Catholic ginger
bared himself in a field,
watching angels be damned.
But it was the guitarist who
made me mix tapes and
in the cheap white sheets
of college town motels
taught me the sweetness
of fire.
Once lit up,
I burned all
the way down.
02.19 | New Hymns