Poetry Spotlight | “You Wanna a Date?” by Derek Thiem

DEREK THIEM is a former English teacher and a street poet based in Portland, Oregon. His poetry and lyrics explore recovery, street life, and Portland’s ever-changing pulse. He occasionally dabbles in themes of astrophysics, metaphysics, and erotica, revealing the unexpected breadth of his creative mind. You can find him on Facebook and YouTube under his name, and hear his work set to music on Suno.com under the monikers VioletKeyboard944 and ExasperatingVocoder2004.

You Wanna Date?

You wanna date?

She asked, as she

Blew smoke across her

Face from a cigar

Outside of closed bars,

5th and Burnside at

330 am.

No.

No, thank you.

Not looking for special friends—

And I think, should I have said Ma’am?

She deserves it.

She deserves more

Than a hundred bucks for

A date,

And I wonder

What else she is waiting for,

As I slowly walk home from

Downtown.

I groan for a moment,

And think I was wrong.

She deserves not to be

Waiting in rain at 330 am

Like this.

Maybe we both deserve more

Than this.

So on second thought,

Let me change my answer.

Yes.

Yes, I want a date.

I want a date for

When Donald Trump, for the first

Time finally reaches his

Comeuppance.

And I want a date for

The end of all this MAGA shit.

I want the date and time

When date rape from a drunken asshole 

Is not allowed on the supreme court.

And I want a date for

When the notorious RBG

Has her own holiday.

And I am waiting for a

Date with destiny

To rescue me from this

ruined dream of a city

That is Portlandia tonight.

The wet streets mix with

Orange incandescent street lights and reflect

My fantasies

Of a different future.

I want a date

For when all this plastic

Will degrade out of

our ecosystem.

And I want a date

For when I can relieve

The mental schism

Of addiction in my head.

I want a date for when

I hear the Grateful Dead

Playing at the pearly gates—

A surreal San Francisco Golden Gate

Bridge, and for all of our

Bridges in Bridgetown to

Finally bridge

The spaces between us.

I wanna date for when

Mercury and Venus

Align just right so that

We can hold each other

At night instead of offering dates for dollars.

I am waiting for the date

That I can dance comfortably numb

But sober in a madcap

Crowd of Pink Floyd frenzy

And sing with you all,

Our voices exalted over

A galactic sound system

Of woofers reverberating

Into the ether

At 40 hertz,

Erasing the hurts of all

Of us

In their bass lines.

I want a date when I can

Hear the tweeters

Sounding like bird songs

Again instead of snarky

Cynicism and

Elon Musk egotism.

And I can understand

Bird tweets a bit—

Charlie Parker taught me

The language on his sax.

He taught an axe could be

A tool

Used to tell a story instead

Of divide,

To unite us with the notes.

After all, this whole thing

Is a free form jazz solo

we embark on together.

Clever riffs, and spliffs,

And the occasional

Harmony.

Harmony,

Yes, harmony.

That is what I want.

I want a date for when

Harmony is more than

The name of the dancer

That saddles up next to me

Looking for a tip.