It was -26C out.
I had turned the key twice but my car wouldn’t start.
It would just growl a little then die.
I gave it a dirty look.
It started.

I drove across a city
covered in ice as brittle as glass
and snow turned hard as stone
screaming along to a rap song I hated
but knew the words to anyways.

I passed a kid who had his tongue stuck to a pole.
His was frantically waving his arms about.
I gave him the finger and hit the gas.

I laughed. He looked like a penguin
except that he was holding a cellphone.
There you go, Buddy. Don’t need your tongue to
text your way out of this one.

Text, Motherfucker, text!

I got to her house and barged in wearing a squirrel.
Putting beers in the fridge I wondered why
it was cold as my ex’s dead heart inside
when she came down wearing a parka without pants
because nothing about her made sense
except her legs.

“I have baseboard heating. It’s too expensive.” She said.

I turned on the sink
hoping for some hot water to splash into my numbed face
but the pilot light must have been off because
it came out colder than glacier run-off in Alaska.
North Alaska.
I thought that it could have been
another money saving device.
What the fuck, was she a penguin too?

Penguins, they were everywhere…they were watching me.

I knew her for ten years.
We’ve only fucked twice
and that made me inexplicably sad
all of a sudden
so I cracked open a tall can.

“Really?” She said. “It’s 10AM.”
“Best to get an early start.”
“Why do you always drink?”
“It helps me face the absolute terror of every day.”
“So, you’re a coward is what you’re saying.”

Women were always on the attack with me.
They hated me secretly and used everything about me
against me with relative ease and the reason
that I hung out with them more than other guys
was because I was the biggest fucking masochist on the planet.

“Jesus, is EVERYTHING cold around here?” I shouted
then gulped the thing down.
‘Oh, that’s nice.” I said.

She laughed. “At least your beer is cold.”

“Yes, it is.” I said. “You are so maddeningly beautiful when you’re disappointed in me. Do you have any perks?”

She smiled, turned around and opened a cupboard.