When boys kiss me. Incidentally, no boys had ever kissed me, but it seemed like just the right irony. I enjoyed words for their sound just as much as their meaning. I started reading Shel Silverstein's poems out loud. Around the same time that I discovered language, I found Suzanne Vega.
Backs are cheap and wings are nearly free.
Curl me up inside and let me hear you through the heat. The passion and freedom with which she uses her words was daring. Her wit was so sly that I couldn't catch all the subtleties until I read more. Her voice was so crisp that it seemed seamless, like an unending ribbon of red silk looping around itself, like the ribbon of chocolate pudding that pours into a bowl in the TV commercial. Suzanne Vega made me want to experiment with language.