Lover's Patrón

You ask me to kiss you

With the bottle of Patrón still by my lip,

Rushing down like water,

And I take another sip.

Dancing around your room,

I trip on the bottle’s empty box on the floor.

Your lover gave it to you,

I give myself another pour.

You ask if you could kiss me,

Just as you asked three years ago,

And I tell you all this time you’ve waited has placed me high up on a pedestal

I can’t promise I can reach, so I reach for the bottle across the bed —

But you grab it from me,

Swinging your lover’s Patrón,

For men only love who I am when we meet,

For you could only love who I was in 2018.

The girl who had 19 years of first impression practice,

From private schools to ballet classes,

Who leaves you wanting more,

But never seconds, never thirds.

I hand you a blurry dream sequence

And memory of a girl you can’t unearth,

A girl whose reputation is carefully curated quirks

And a refusal to kiss you as you think you’re worth.

And you turn it into a world,

Spiral it into attraction, shove,

Shape it into lust —

You swing it into love,

I swing the bottle.

And I let you kiss my mouth as it nurses your lover’s Patrón

And tomorrow, you’ll check it off your bucket list

And tell her you drank it alone.