I spotted a tattooed girl through the crowd of bar goers and made a beeline. Sue me. And then we were in the bathroom and she was tugging on my lower lip and I’d like to say that we were being quiet to make the hoop earring girls comfortable, but we weren’t. Oops!
In between kisses she called me pretty. I hadn’t been called pretty in a long time. She said other things too. Things I probably shouldn’t write in a fragment like this one. And she gathered my dress in her fists and kneeled on the grimy floor and her eyes were celestite when she asked, “Is this okay?”
Is this okay?
You’re so pretty.
You’re beautiful.
You’re—
Yes.
Yes.
Yes,
Carolyn Gevinski is a poet and journalist based in New York City. Her poetry can be found in Lavender Review, Prosetrics, Across the Margin, and After/Thought Literary. Her journalism has been published in El País, GLAMOUR UK, and Al Jazeera. She has a master’s degree from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, where she currently works as a postgraduate reporter fellow. For more on Carolyn, please visit her website or LinkedIn.
