Poems

She threatens to love them like this forever    in pieces  flabby patchwork of his  lost sheet music

So let’s collect our birthed things, no matter / how small or useless, & store them on museum / shelves.

He was asking me / to read his mind / and smell him, acquire memories / with him / that would float through my life with me.

Come morning, a blankness— / what was once the sky and is now / an answer.

The / hibiscus out my window now blooms  the bright / tongue & lips of the Rolling Stones  car-freshener / hanging from the rearview mirror  of my tío’s / Chevy.

And the numbers—the numbers / I see every morning—not birds / but people! people!—

I am listening to the gone / I am listening to the going / even when not / speaking or singing 

Our table / more unearthed / than built by an ox / of an earthy man // that speaks in a dialect

Have you dressed for the mirror today Have you draped the darkening glass in gauze

I never thought I’d live to see / us out of the house, on our own.

No matter how long, / I have more of myself to lose. 

I did this. Took my own photo, / painted over my eyes, listened / closer.