BERTHA'S MEN. (STRONG LANGUAGE)

[dadio]

Bertha has this funny thing about men.
Ever since her fifteenth birthday party

When Miles Moronic introduced her to
The fine art of female fucking. She sits

Undressing, meditating on the day’s
Work, rest and play and the Boss’s meddling,

His fingering and the typing up of
His letters, taking down his boring speech,

Using shorthand, keeping an eye, watching
His wandering paw. She takes off stockings,

Drops them to the floor. Mother would chide her
For leaving clothes about, her harsh voice like

Some seagull in flight. She kicks the stockings
Across the room; her choice now, her mother

Tucked away in some home for the dying.
Then of course, there was her first husband, Earl

Who utilized his sexual rights like
A predator with game, night after night

After night until the night he croaked on
Top of her uttering his last ave.

Bertha removes the dress over her head,
Messing the hair, throws on a chair. Then there

Was Bugsy who spoilt her and loved her and
Gave her flowers and chocs and expensive

Skirts, blouses and frocks, but then he left her
For some Italian bitch after his

Seven-year itch. She takes off her panties,
Lets them fall, steps out of them, kicking them

Under the bed (her tangled love nest) to
Join the rest. She has this thing about men:

Can’t live with them, but can’t live without them.
Like some drug in the blood. A narcotic

On which she’s hooked and high. Weldover said
He’d love her forever, but he went off

With another, some wisecracking broad, some
Blonde Bronx hussy, he wasn’t worried,

He wasn’t fussy. Bertha stands naked
Before the mirror. What’s not to like? What’s

Not to love and want? She says, her voice now
Lonely in her shabby room, her unmade

Bed just behind, a bare light bulb above
Her head and the ghosts of her lost lovers

Wandering the room calling for her, but
She doesn’t talk, doesn’t speak to the dead.