Novella

by Paul Dertien

spoil you, spank you—
you little novella
show you off at cocktail parties
where you run off

with a semiotician—
on the balcony flirting
with a vulgar Marxist
would you ditch even plot/chx
for contextual process?
theorize a nursery rhyme?
pander to porn?

I’m leaving you for poetry
content and frivolous in a beat
to rediscover a smoother nuance

until you call,
dramatic, abandoned
overwrought, no one left to listen
a mere sliver of potential really
yet your tatters enough
to make my heart pound

in the morning, after coffee
you are all mine
shake me up over and over
spill me on the page
another day belongs to you