Vampires Today

Once, there was a year where every romance

    had fangs. It was hard to open up a novel

without a vampire bearing down on a young, virgin neck.

Soon, they were on the television. Later, the sidewalks.

    Teenagers. They owned us with their hackneyed plots.

Platinum fleur-de-lis emblazoned on their jeans.

How do they wash them? I asked. They don’t,

    my friend said. It’s part of what keeps them so dark and stiff.

An entire generation has arrived dark and stiff. Unlike

my pliable, light, pubescent years. I grew up reading

    Little House on the Prairie. Sweet, blind Mary

stole my heart. Turn the page. Oklahoma. Wild mustangs.

Malaria. And Pa. Talk about a hero. Now they have boys

    so angry they transform into wild, shirtless dogs.

They are maniacs, these fans. They beg their mothers

to drive them to the theater where they burst

    into dollars and popcorn in their seats. They want the car

tossed off their withering girl bodies. Lured from

their couches, they are eager to be taken from their lives

    and placed directly in the vampire’s mouth. Younger

and younger. Cha-ching. Is there nothing anyone can do?