Living in Western Washington...as far as finding a decent man goes, it sucks.

When you were raised like I was, you know that your prince charming is going to come from the South. So, as I have lived in the Pacific Northwest, home of the Seattle Freeze (if you don't know what that is, it's the cold, scathing look you get when you say hello to perfect strangers in the street), for the last thirteen years of my life, you can imagine how easy it is to find one of those.

I was tired of the skinny, string bean, self-obsessed hipsters that strut along the streets of every city I wander in this God-forsaken drizzle-ridden hell. Not to worry. I don't really hate Washington all that much, though I would much rather live somewhere else if I was given the choice. I love the smiles of people when I visit my grandparents in Virginia, how you can stop any of them and have a decent conversation, then walk away and never have to know their name. Most of all, I remember my mother telling me that when she first lived in Enid, OK, with my dad after they got married, she'd never, ever have to pay for her drinks at the bars, because another man would always pay, simply because they wanted to show how nice they could be. And, yes, they might have just been doing it for some chauvinistic reasons, or they may have genuinely cared about making some strange lady special. All ulterior motives aside, I was desperate after my break-up with yet another self-involved pansy to care about attempting to find another man homegrown here. This is what came of my exasperation.

Lament of the Metropolitan Girl

Sauntering over unworried concrete that safeguards against earth, leaf, twig, fauna,

that keeps winding brush and bracken at bay,

I sorrowfully glean that there is little modern need for strong men.

Men who covet strength, who dream of being the muscled red-blooded heroes,

live in lulling comfort, tucked away in brick villas and oak cottages.

Soon, they take on the hysterics that women have conveniently long since abandoned

I yearn for a man, bloody-knuckled, wild tempered, and steeled,

with a five o’ clock shadow (hardly tolerated within civil company) and dirtied jeans,

ripped from labor and not some addlepated twit in some design office trying to give

her clients the false edge they cannot earn.

I shuffle past these peacocks, preening their perfectly coiffed faux-hawks, hidden beneath

fur lined hoods of H&M jackets, as their TOMS patter over the pavement…

enough to make my ovaries shrivel and turn in repulsion.

These are no men – bright birds without so much tooth or claw.

Give me a griffon instead: a beast, terrible beauty that could dismember my greatest foes,

who does not care to avoid the fray merely for the sake of keeping his feathers sleek.

At night, I lay waking as my wish bores holes in my mind.

I think of a man, not so frail that he cannot rock me to a molten place, eroded smooth

from a weathering heart and jarring disappointments.

Not so egocentric is he that he is unable to view my pleasure as a measure of his worth,

unable to get past anything but a man’s beady-eyed, onyx lined release.

The little jungle cat may purr and slink to entice, but matured am I that seeks out the truth

beneath flashy pelt, for something of more substance.

Only the elusive leopard’s prowess may gain sway over my wearied heart

as he sinks his claws into that prey known as my undivided attention.

No more momma’s boys for me – no.

But the rugged man shall someday make me his inamorata.