….or as Hamlet says,

“Words, words, words.”

There was a time,

Shakespeare’s, actually,

when The Virgin was called “silly”,

when a man who desired men

was called “faggot”.

Then “silly” evolved to “special”

and “faggot” became “gay”

and if you were

a Southern California surfer,

a “bitchin’ curl”

was a great wave.

Thrice removed from the gut-checks

we struggle to explain,

words are but leaky vessels

to carry our dreams and our pain.

Yet apart from a deep-tounged French kiss

or a chop to the throat,

it seems they’re all we’ve got.

So instead of compressing them

into AOL shorthand

or a Facebook imoge

diversify ’em,

intensify ’em,

with alacrity and dispatch,

so to help your lover feel

how charged is your passion for him,

or how lethal is hates venom

aimed at that bastard neighbor

who, for just a short time longer,

feeds in his cess-pool

next door.