Face it, Tiger… you just hit the Jackpot!
                                        The Amazing Spider-Man #42

a little known gem
in the Multiverse
more rare than kryptonite

is that Mary Jane
and the Man of Steele
were once a fiery item

it was his pre-newspaper days
when he was writing novels
in rented basements

countless nights in front of a woodstove burning words
typewriter churning chords in harmony with Mark Knopfler’s guitar

until he met MJ in a multi-genre workshop her brilliant hair shining
but not disguising her brain while he sat across from her wanting to put her in a story

and she was a poet of course
and her poems were songs
and the way she sang them moved him

Mary Jane who never met a stranger
and Superman going by the pen name Dusty Steele
proving as private as his fortress of solitude

but the downstairs fire flickered as a pale pyre
in the presence of their combustion
and the mountain cold could not chill them

MJ’s eyes set him aflame but one day she’d see through the disguise interpreting lies
though he thought the truth this time wasn’t that simple and when they broke up

he did have to admit that he knew it was done when she saw a sexy picture text preview
from April O’Neil whom he was having what he convinced himself was a harmless flirtation
later Mary Jane would say
some other redheaded chick in reference
but she’d already known she couldn’t keep him

not because he was so easy on the eyes
but because when she moved in with him
he refused to merge any of their things even after years

and she called it only child syndrome to shrug it off
but knew then he’d never let her be half of a whole
so in this story Mary Jane is unable to laugh

everyone knows there’s a lot of lines about love and loss and the lilts of laughter in between
Superman knows more than most saving so many souls from being written off early

and when he’s considering abrupt ends while flying Denver skies or sailing to Philadephia it’s in early morning fog the Man of Steele wishes he were the tiger to Mary Jane’s jackpot