Boyfriends & Girlfriends

2 poems by Sharon Mesmer

Totalitarian Boyfriend

Okay, my totalitarian boyfriend started me off stripping at cinemas.

I was rapt towards the uncomprehended irony of the tyranny of Obeying
like one who sweats before a despot's farts.

Now my scary totalitarian monster boyfriend keeps following me
throughout the universe.
I love him because he is such an unnatural promethean farting despot.

Here is my loving boyfriend arriving in Saddam's rape room,
leading the same bitter, passionate revolt against Catholicism with which Apollinaire
brought Surrealism into the world.

But Bobby is so totally likable, he lifts Surrealism from its sudsy roots
and elevates it to something worthy of memory.
The gang is so totally in love with him now,
winning the energies of intoxication for revolution!
He's doing well in Japan, and not only that,
he's totally English and rides a moped and is creative.
He smiles at himself in the mirror and is metaphorical
with profane illuminations.
He should totally run for president of Hottie-land
especially as his praxis oscillates between fitness exercises and totalitarianism
in advance.

But soon that mean little despot will be hovering around my desk,
and between me and your ostensibly flawed surface,
my paramour will burble like President Roosevelt who put the door in
so people would not know he was farting in his wheelchair.
Why does love got to be so sad?

If you were a totalitarian government, wouldn't it be in your best interest to stick with an abusive
boyfriend because your self-esteem is so low?
My first totalitarian boyfriend, who I referred to in secret as "Ricky"
because he looked just like Ricky Schroeder,
had freckles and liked to barge in on therapy sessions.
What sort of character believes we're already in a dark, totalitarian future?
My current totalitarian ex-boyfriend is Adoloh Hilter,
who suffers from depressions and is only 17.
He can't help it if he has gas when we have sex.
He is busy aping a cloud in trousers.
And placing fanatical stress on the mysterious side of the mysterious. 
My dog has a gas problem, too, but I wouldn't choose my dog
over my boyfriend, who said he had found a job,
but it turned out to be a blow job.

The whole idea that a cult has to have only one totalitarian leader is just wrong.
What famous-talented-gay-graphic-novelist and his totalitarian boyfriend Dickie
escaped into the arms of Katie's brand of Scientology?
Wow, I really got under Scientology's protective layer of Body Thetans.
I wonder what I could have done to receive my very own personalized
Toronto Scientology sock-puppet?

Yet so advanced is the totalitarian impulse in Canada
that advocates of the paramour of Syrian fascist despot Hafez Al-Assad
will admit Mark Hall to the prom with his oy-friend.
He always acted like a little dick anyway, the omnipotent and omnipresent despot
of the Pigeon Family.
At the prom knives were brandished, bottles got broken over heads,
and one unlucky paramour was brought to the ground
by a blast of steam from an iron.
Rape was hinted at, and emotional cruelty was rife.
There was full frontal nudity and guys frenched each other.
And there were problems with my totalitarian boyfriend's medieval motets.
And then a kamikaze (KAH-mih-KAH-zee) bobsled run left him crippled.

I believe the modern women's movement is more totalitarian in its methods
than my totalitarian boyfriend.
There is only one kind of of feminism and that's feminine feminism.
Gee, I guess the media reform honeymoon must be over.


Fascist Girlfriend

When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag,
And you will soon discover that your fascist girlfriend
Is some fascist's ex-girlfriend.
She will deploy evil sexual sponges,
Annoying sing-a-longs while driving,
And her whole "dance-of-light-with-several-scarves-thing" will suddenly seem
All strung-out, sort of.
All those lovely mornings-after
Will be bourgeois attacks on nationalism
With five fascist planes always circling overhead.
Boy, you shouldn't have to pay for that, if you're a union man.
Besides, you're fighting against fascism for The Girlfriend
Who Wants To Get Herself Pregnant By Hitler.
She's a fascist meme transmitter,
A garden-variety corrupt Republican a-hole.
And there's some consensus among the young
That certain fully-brained girlfriends exhibit the ten distinct fascist features of
Former Trotskyite right-wing chicken-butt Klingons.
Musharaff isn't exactly a populist, but isn't he more nationalist
Than your fascist girlfriend?
I mean, she thinks "Starship Troopers" was a good movie --
The sign of a true fascist.
Look - this is Saddam, this is Mussolini,
And this is your girlfriend's crack.
Or maybe her dad's.


© Sharon Mesmer, 2006