the lady bug tattoo

she wants to know if I like
her tattoos.
she shows me the butterfly
on her shoulder.
a golden thing with
cartoonish wings.
and then the lizard on her
ankle, lime green, crawling
up perhaps to eat
the butterfly, but there's
more. the scorpion on her thigh,
the Harley wings
above the round curves
of her back side.
someone's name
in blue, a runny blue
on the fat of her arm,
maybe Charlie, or
Jimmy, hard to tell now
in the wrinkles and sag
of wobbled skin.
I have a bug too, she says,
a lady bug strategically
placed, but I don't know
you well enough to show you
that. in time, she says.
to which you answer,
we'll see. perhaps.