I’d’ve taken a shot, and fucked the wrong person,
and eaten too much, and dropped out and crawled back,
and flown across the ocean, and covered my body with tattoos,
and slept on Faulkner’s grave, and posted my nude photos,
and tried cocaine exactly four times, and sold everything,
and let my brother’s best man finger me on Mom’s washer that Christmas,
and believed I was the world’s only true exception.
If you’d told me we’ve never had any responsibility at all
and that every day is a series of nanoscale willful yeses,
maybe I’d have kissed you then, and ruined our friendship
(Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life in the background),
or maybe I would have cleaned you up, rinsed the bathtub of vomit,
tucked you into the queen mattress on your splotched flophouse carpet,
driven home through Boston’s lunar November midnight,
and done everything exactly the same.
Jade Sylvan, called a ârisquĂ© queer iconâ by The Boston Globe, is the author of Kissing Oscar Wilde (Write Bloody 2013), TEN (Launch Over Publishing 2013), and The Spark Singer (Spuyten Duyvil 2009). A genderqueer writer, producer, and performing artist based out of Cambridge, MA, Jade has been on the cover of The Boston Globe Arts Section, ScoutCambridge, and DigBoston. Sylvan has toured throughout North America and Europe performing poetry, and has produced and performed in a number of acclaimed shows in the Greater Boston area, including The Literary Roast, All You Need Is Myth, and Encyclopedia Show Somerville. In 2012, Jade co-wrote and starred in the indie feature film TEN, which is currently touring the film festival circuit. Publications include pieces in The Toast, BuzzFeed, PANK, Carve Magazine, Mudfish, Word Riot, and many more.Â
Image: “Live With No Regrets by Jason Howie via Flickr
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