Ah, February. I should, like Target, devote myself this month to Eros. Although at Target perhaps every day is Valentine's Day: the bull's eye, the pit bull, the red, red, red.
Here are two works that appeared in a love and marriage issue of Quick Fiction a few years ago. It's a print magazine, but you can access some work at www.quickfiction.org.
Wedding Vows
by Eliot Khalil Wilson
. . . and I'd like to add that I will mind like a dog. I will wear whatever you like. I will go wingtip. No more white socks. A necktie stitched to my throat, turtlenecks in August. New York gray or black, only colors dogs can see. I will know of squash, vermouth, and wedges. I will do all the grilling because I love you so. I will drive the wagon, man the bar, weed-whack compulsively. I will make money, the bed, never a to-do.
I will build like an Egyptian, a two-mile pier complex, a five-story deck. I will listen like a bat, attend to the birth of sounds in the back of your throat. I will remember like an Indian elephant, recall requests made of me in a previous life. Your date of birth will be carved in the palm of my hand. I will make good. I will do right. I will sleep on the pegboard on the wall in the garage.
I'll have a tongue like a sperm whale, eyes like a harp seal, biceps like a fiddler crab I will have gold coins, gold rings, stiff gold hair like shredded wheat. I will be golden at receptions, gold in your pocket, Paganini in your pants. Money will climb over the house like ivy. Excellent credit will be my white whale. I will always. I will every day. I will nail the seat down. I will let you pretend I am your father.
I will be a priapic automatic teller machine, never down, never a usage fee, a stock prophet, a paramutual seer, tractable, worshipful no matter what. I will always want to. I won't notice what you don't point out. I will entertain your friends, say how your love saved me. I will convince them. I will talk, really talk, to them. Deep meanings will be toothpicked and passed around.
I will need zero maintenance. I will be a utility or a railroad. There will be no breakdowns or disconnections. I will allow you lovers. Moroccan teenagers and Turkish men. I will adopt them. I will not cry. I will respond to grief by earning more. My sweat will smell like drug money, like white bread baking. I will be as clean as a Mormon, wholesome like Iowa. I will lead. I will be a star, a rock, like Rock Hudson.
Picked Her Fresh
by Wayne Sullins
When I was eighteen, leaving Amarillo on a bus, I saw this girl in a blue summer dress standing in the doorway of a house you'd think should've fallen down already, and knew right away I'd marry trash.
Boy, did I find trash -- good and white and rank as sin. Her name is Lily, like the flower.
Here are two works that appeared in a love and marriage issue of Quick Fiction a few years ago. It's a print magazine, but you can access some work at www.quickfiction.org.
Wedding Vows
by Eliot Khalil Wilson
. . . and I'd like to add that I will mind like a dog. I will wear whatever you like. I will go wingtip. No more white socks. A necktie stitched to my throat, turtlenecks in August. New York gray or black, only colors dogs can see. I will know of squash, vermouth, and wedges. I will do all the grilling because I love you so. I will drive the wagon, man the bar, weed-whack compulsively. I will make money, the bed, never a to-do.
I will build like an Egyptian, a two-mile pier complex, a five-story deck. I will listen like a bat, attend to the birth of sounds in the back of your throat. I will remember like an Indian elephant, recall requests made of me in a previous life. Your date of birth will be carved in the palm of my hand. I will make good. I will do right. I will sleep on the pegboard on the wall in the garage.
I'll have a tongue like a sperm whale, eyes like a harp seal, biceps like a fiddler crab I will have gold coins, gold rings, stiff gold hair like shredded wheat. I will be golden at receptions, gold in your pocket, Paganini in your pants. Money will climb over the house like ivy. Excellent credit will be my white whale. I will always. I will every day. I will nail the seat down. I will let you pretend I am your father.
I will be a priapic automatic teller machine, never down, never a usage fee, a stock prophet, a paramutual seer, tractable, worshipful no matter what. I will always want to. I won't notice what you don't point out. I will entertain your friends, say how your love saved me. I will convince them. I will talk, really talk, to them. Deep meanings will be toothpicked and passed around.
I will need zero maintenance. I will be a utility or a railroad. There will be no breakdowns or disconnections. I will allow you lovers. Moroccan teenagers and Turkish men. I will adopt them. I will not cry. I will respond to grief by earning more. My sweat will smell like drug money, like white bread baking. I will be as clean as a Mormon, wholesome like Iowa. I will lead. I will be a star, a rock, like Rock Hudson.
Picked Her Fresh
by Wayne Sullins
When I was eighteen, leaving Amarillo on a bus, I saw this girl in a blue summer dress standing in the doorway of a house you'd think should've fallen down already, and knew right away I'd marry trash.
Boy, did I find trash -- good and white and rank as sin. Her name is Lily, like the flower.
