The blur of graffiti and old punk show postings as the bus turns down Center Street makes my stomach do that flip-floppy nauseous thing. You know, that same feeling you get after eating three-day-old sushi, or passing a pretty girl on a crowded sidewalk. My sister tells me, in her important big sister voice, that I've had too many girlfriends.

Say I'm not a real
Man one more time, Emma. You
Were always too fat.

I tell her, in my smug little brother voice, that there are just too many pretty girls to pass by on crowded sidewalks. There's no time to get invested in each one.

She points a green-splotched finger at the notebook in my lap. “Then why do you write shitty poetry about them all?”

I don't write shitty poetry, I tell her, shaking the battered sketchpad in front of her face. I write scathing poetry. Haikus. I write scathing haikus about all the evil girls I've dated, and post them in public places.

Summer breezes and
Spring rains all smell better than
That bitch Harriet.

“And you don't see anything, say, creepy and obsessive and sad about that?”

I've explained all of this to her before. She happens to think about life in colors. In shades and tints and stripes and spots. In photorealistic representations of trees in the park. I think of ex-girlfriends in haikus. We're all unique flowers, or whatever.

I post them on walls in front of subway stations and supermarkets because they deserve it. I don't tell my sister that part.

May is a month for
Pretty flowers. She's also a
Frigid, psycho cow.

“Don't you think it's just a little petty, Mikey? They're gone, and it's just stupid. I don't paint ugly pictures of my ex-boyfriends.” I tell her that it's different once you're married. You don't have to be vindictive anymore, because there’s nobody you have to impress.

We step off the bus, and I pause by the bulletin board outside of the grocery store. I'm flipping through the sketchbook, wondering whether to put up Anna, or Louise, or Sherri, when my sister puts her hand on my shoulder. She just points at the bulletin board.

Dozens of sheets of colored paper cover the board, each with seventeen syllables printed on them, all about me. Some with initials, some without. My sister looks at me, her eyes all watery, the corners of her mouth straining to hold back that annoying laugh of hers.

Okay, I guess it is a little creepy and obsessive.

Please don’t ever date
Michael Keane. He can't kiss, and
His penis is small.

And a little bit sad.