Pith & Vinegar: "Hi, Question for You"

For your reading pleasure -- a selection from I Am Spam (2004), my most recently published book of poems, 'inspired' by spam email subject lines. I lament that I didn't include my first successful spam poem in there, too, but once I got it in my head that I wanted to try to do a whole book I had many more titles on hand that I wanted to try writing from. Of course, it could've gone on (and on, and on) as well.

Hi, Question for You

Where did you get that?
I hope I’m not being too personal.
It looks great on you.
I could never wear one of those,
my butt’s too big,
pardon my French.

Oh, are you French?
Parlez-vous Français?
Habla Español?
You look kinda European,
especially with that on.

When you take it off,
do you have to hang it up?
Does it wrinkle easily?
I hate to iron; come to think
of it, I don’t even own one.
An iron, I mean,
because obviously, I don’t
have one of those, although
I’ve always wanted one.

How much did it cost?
In American dollars.
I’ve been saving up
and would like to give myself
a gift, you know, something
special. Just like that.