A Penny for Your Penii

“Why do I hurt all over?”
he asks me, by way of his puppy dog eyes
and his slobbering tongue.
“Is it the crumbs all over the goddamn carpet
or my assless chaps
or both?”

And the truth is
I don’t know.

The only thing I am certain of anymore is that
touching a pug right on
his penis is a slippery slope
that leads to a micropig in
a tiny raincoat and booties chasing
the entire Mormon Tabernacle Choir
into the dreams of Donald J. Trump
on the eve of his second inaugural.
And I’m also certain that, if we ain’t careful,
old Donnie Boy will forget to cut the part of
the speech where he goes on about how
life for American Indians was forever
changed when the White Man
introduced them to
road head.

And you know that can’t come out.
You know they’ll have no reservations
about leaving the reservations
and invading this land that
ain’t my land, that
ain’t your land—
this land that wasn’t made for you
or me.

So, when he asks me again,
what I tell him is that bit about
what Teach for America is using to
inspire inner city students to succeed:
a snapping turtle biting
the tips of their penises.
And maybe, I say, maybe they’ve started
doing that to dogs, too.