Ode to the Old Man in a Speedo

I seem to have nothing to say lately, so I'm going to relive the glory days and post this poem that I wrote when I was in eighth grade following a trip to a local hot spring:

Ode to the Old an in a Speedo
by Alexis Morgan, age 13

You're too old for this
You're just in denial
Shrivelled up and veiny
Like something from the X-Files.

Some people stare at car wrecks
And they try to get a view
People like things gory
That's why those girls are looking at you.

Try changing your diet
If you want to wear a Speedo
You get another chin
With every beef burrito.

You need to get over yourself
Before I start to vomit
But on the other hand
I guess I'm glad you didn't thong it.

Springtime!

Even the plants are thinking about sex right now.  All those sprawled-out blossoms put some kind of reproductive vibe into the air, I think, in some universal-consciousness kind of way.  I keep thinking about the sexual nature of flowers while I walk down the street, and it kind of creeps me out, mostly because it conjures up so many icky, traditional metaphors – women as flowers that gussy themselves up with colors and scents to attract the man-bees; the beauty of a woman as budding, blossoming, wilting, going to seed; men as mobile bees that go from stationary flower to stationary flower spreading pollen; good lord is that what I'm doing when I put on perfume and eyeliner, trying to get my ass pollinated?  Ew, am I, at age 23, a "Woman in Full Bloom"?  Ew ew ew.

But seriously, I really do believe that part of the reason everyone gets so horny in the springtime is that the rest of nature, even the plant life, is in its mating season, and all the blossoming throws some kind of sexual energy into the air.  Plus of course there's the reemergence of limbs, and bodies that are just visible enough to picture naked.  And your arm hairs are getting brushed by the breeze again in an almost-too-chilly way, and that air on your skin makes you aware of your body as something that exists in space and that interacts with the world (when I'm all bundled-up I feel like I'm traveling in some kind of puffy car because my skin never gets to feel the outside world and it's like being in my own little transit-universe).

This is my favorite time of year.  All those splay-legged blossoms seem a little ostentatious, but they smell great and it's fun being one of them.

The Skin on Your Butt

Think for a moment about the skin on your butt.  If you live a normal urban life, the skin on your butt only ever touches fabric (underwear, pants, bedsheets), water (shower, bath), toilet seat, toilet paper, and the skin (and maybe lips) of another person.  Fabric, water, toilet seats, TP, and flesh.  That's IT.  That's all your butt ever gets to experience.  Isn't that kind of sad?