The Preacher’s Daughter

We drink too much pineapple rum, straight from the bottle,

bitch about the red-haired girl, the fetish model,

a preacher’s daughter with a thing for unreasonable shoes.

From her faded patchwork quilt, bleeding

hearts, we watched her mutate into a PVC Alice Liddell.

How did she manage in seven-inch patent heels?

She was tall as wheat — or the ceiling was low.

Cradling a mewing ginger-ball, she kissed the mirror

where their confederate-blue eyes

matched. Three scars began to scab on her arm,

deep big-cat scrawls she told us she cut herself

because it’s art and her clients like her

that way. We followed her clip-clop down

the rabbit hole; me, to hear tales of her running track

in those shoes; you, to see her white skin even paler

under lights. Back in your dorm room, I am static.

You pay to watch her pixelated Snow White online;

complain her constant chatter ruined it, or her, for you.