……She scolded me for carving my initials in a camphor trunk, but I couldn’t take it back, couldn’t replace the bits of bark into the smooth void, into the cool beauty of the inner flesh. ……I remember the feel, the contrast of the reveal, the
If I say “we goin’ to hell in a handbasket”, will you know what I mean? Will you try to excavate meaning? Will you be mean? If my grandmother breathes, will you try to eat her language? Will it frighten you? Will it consume you?
after Claudia Rankine my obsession with unforgetting takes ink-shape. I wake up and count them: right wrist— pink poppy right back triceps— red left back forearm— María inner left biceps— Mother if they’re still there, then I’m still in the same body. amaze me days,
Dance be all of this beat we beat into the earth. Every celebration broke in by the feet. We stomp our names into this dirt. Let praise be the mouth that bakes the child whole. Oh holy rhythm, how we laugh from you. My grandma
Consider hunger that thuds. More than a fig beetle fidgeting in a jelly jar. Its metallic green varnish a water splash over motor oil. The parking lot of the dollar store on the corner of Holt & San Antonio where the security guard’s head bobs,
Here where the stones grow sharp and sometimes seem to pick themselves up to strike soft, stiletto men. Here the screw-faced men try the sun on their tongues, mount public pulpits and preach boom bye bye against Gomorrah – a man who must be burnt
Somewhere South or East or North of here a little girl is learning she is hollow like somewhen a girl pried herself from the pomegranate bark and walked away her father pries her tin can torso open waves his hand inside I don’t want to
Because she spun a downy web in the corner of my bedroom and sat patiently unperturbed. Because it counted as saying it aloud to a living being, a body of matter and feeling, even if the words were for myself, sticky strings pulled from my
I dream of burning my body sometimes. ……..I stopped bloodletting months ago ……..after the scars on my arms began oozing out hopes for everybody to see after crimson thighs …………………………………………………began to shout and molt shedding desire and guilt. ……..I am
Sitting on a plane, just three-years-old, I asked my mother: are we in heaven? She said: no, I don’t believe in heaven. Three years later, I said my first prayer. Not to god, but to the earth, I prayed: please make my mother stop crying. She