I read Craig’s List for poetry prompts.
I see you saw me.

To the middle-aged blonde
In the black fur-collared coat
With the curly rain-soaked hair.
You had three bags of food,
A brown bag from the liquor store.
I am watching you hurl it all into the back hatch of your black SUV.

I want you to watch me please myself,
Rid myself of this strip-mall ennui–
Maybe you’d hop in my front seat,
And be the girl I’ve always wished for.

Which car is yours, dude–
The silver Mercedes, or the old rusty Toyota?
The one with the faded and cracked Make America Great Again bumper sticker?

Are your kids in the car, sugary hands strapped in car seats,
Purple slushies propped between babyflesh legs?

Watching Baby Shark on your cellphone?

Susan Cossette is the author of Peggy Sue Messed Up (2017). A two-time recipient of the University of Connecticut’s Wallace Stevens Poetry Prize, her work has appeared in Rust and Moth, Adelaide, Clockwise Cat, Anti-Heroin Chic, The Scarecrow and in the anthologies Tuesdays at Curley’s and After the Equinox.