"If You Swipe Right on My Tinder Profile at Dragon Con,

I Can Only Tell You One Thing for Sure" by Amber Decker
 

If you want to be Batman

I can be Batgirl, à la Barbara Gordon

because I've always been better

as a redhead. We can drink spiked punch

in the Hilton ballroom while the DJ spins

that Sir Mixalot song about butts

for the sixteeth time, and we can make out later

in the elevator on our way to the rooftop

where Spider-Man and the 500 alternate versions

of Deadpool that show up every year are probably

getting high and watching the lights on the CNN tower

flash from red to white and back again.

The homeless will be pitching tents

down below, wherever they can find space

and gathering up all the loose change dropped by

stupid fucking tourists like us

who are busy trying to escape

the privileged drag of day-to-day

monotony, busy trying to find the hero

we are desperate to believe is buried deep

inside the itchy, tiger-striped flesh

of all the PC bullshit we've spent

our working years passively getting used to.

Maybe I need a savior tonight. Maybe

I can save myself. Who knows? But either way,

I'll be grateful for the company. Tomorrow,

it will be a thousand degrees in direct sunlight,

and all the conventioners will choke

in layers of spandex and latex and cheap polyester

and parade up and down these Atlanta avenues, all

"Look at me! Look at me!"

like colorful parrots chattering

with all their fake feathers on display

while everyone else just watches and takes pictures

and leaves the streets a post-apocalyptic mess.

So, if you don't mind, can we just work together

for a few hours to save the fresh-faced,

Instagrammed, hashtagged,

digital proof of the best versions of us

in some glacial, disco-lit hotel room,

a couple of degenerate superheroes

drunk on god-knows-what,

taking whatever is handed to us by the

unsteady hands of the neon night

until we are just two bodies,

or birds, or planes,

or impossibly tall buildings on fire

trying to keep each other warm,

safe and solid

for awhile

in the quiet, smoky dark

until we collapse?

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