mumber 2
I have only ever left this planet once
in a billow of thistles
after snorting meth amphetamine
in an abandoned record store
in Hollywood, birds settling
into the window sills
Again in space
Bird, the bird.
Could write of fucking.
Dreary, heavy.
Each gesture
Flesh’s / signals.
GANGSTER.
Hadn’t I been?
It is some time since I have been
JUST FRIENDS
In a mo, you will be transported
to a civic amphitheater bedraped in rainbow flags
where a thirteen-year-old chanteuse will sing cumbia
I’ve been keeping the quarter-full can of caffeine-free diet cola
Ma left in my refrigerator four weeks ago,
visiting from the chicken farm
I want to live long enough to outlive my mother
so she never learns of the needles hidden throughout my apartment
the way she once hid money from herself
for times when she didn’t work enough
and I pray if she ever learns
Lo, the color of my mustache,
chestnut-shell with flecks of gold-leaf,
signaling to the world I take myself too
everythingly. Lo,
There is a broad forgotten flower
in the ruins of our days, rising
immaculate from the frozen earth,
its purple heart waiting for a woman’s
name: Rose, Iris, Veronica,
Daphne.