The Come On

by Sarah Henry

They say you have to be careful

about meeting men on the internet.

There are a lot of phonies posting

fake pictures. It’s easy to be taken

in by faces that are easy on the eyes.

Fifty never looked this fabulous.

Sixty-two is not the new fifty.

The guy who says he works

long hours is always married.

A Ph.D. wants to sit by the fire.

Doing what? It’s combustion when

there’s a blank square with no face,

meaning the man is in prison.

He went postal last year.

Send money!

Here’s a tan guy with deep-set

eyes smiling so broadly he must

want a woman to fall for him

long distance. Send money

to fetch him from an island

so he can bring it all back.

Who wants to buy a hunk?

It’s bait and switch.

Look at the poor slob leaning

against a borrowed foreign car.
He can barely afford his T-shirt.

Now there’s a view of a stone

Tudor house planted firmly

on a wooded lot, no owner

in sight. The gentleman says

he likes to entertain the ladies.

Watching this parade is like

having pornography come

into my home. A different man

appears on the screen.

He’s forty if he’s a day.

Maybe needs a nose job.

Claims all his friends are married

and he’s the only single left.

He wants to settle down.

It’s obvious he’s not a stud

who works long hours.

My inbox is filled with hope.

The man’s sincere.

I’ll e-mail him, cautiously.

Maybe he’ll answer.

I’m forty.

* * * * *

Sarah Henry studied with two U.S. poets laureate at the University of Virginia. Today she lives near Pittsburgh, where her poems have appeared in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the Pittsburgh Poetry Review. Farther afield, Sarah's work was included in Soundings East, The Hollins Critic, Writing in a Woman's Voice, Mused: The BellaOnline Literary Review, and other journals, as well as three humor publications. She is retired from a newspaper.