“She like, why you don’t buy me Reeboks no more?” – Jay-Z, “Girls, Girls, Girls” Got homies in the deep south and two parts of Newark, bartenders in the East Village and West, white-walled bedrooms, their Mamas’ cribs writing love letters, blowing up my cell making promises sweet as B-sides to take me to St. Tropez, to jump when my drink looks low. In California the dudes are so cute they’re stupid, smash Nattys on the sides of their skulls, get me high in backseats and the corners of suburban house parties. For years I’ve been scattering them: blue-eyed men coloring one side of the sun, long-haired guys sweaty with treble, hustlers with shiny rims for teeth, running always from wild plants and police. Applicants without extensive dicks and cash flows need to sit the fuck down. Everyone else, you alright, except I’ll expect you to change for me. I know you won’t, I whisper to every boy every morning while he snores, stiff and hairy in my bed. I’ll take whatever but: New kicks better be so fly I lose my breath. The wanting more can make a sister crazy so I settle for free shit: trade you digits for dinner and treat this like the business it is. I can make a mixtape my own damn self.