Collect

I wanted a bloody fight.

Billy unrecognizable. To know
I could be the bullet.
The severed line that carried
his southern, inbred spits,
and returned them to him

a death rattle.

I wanted to be the receiver,
the speaker,
the ear piece and pick axe.
A pinch, an eardrum, warm
brick red. A sudden pain

that needed a place to stay.

I wanted to be my sis’s ruptured skull,
her fingerprints,
vertebrae cracking in reverse.
Violence forcing my way

into Billy’s throat.

Because Billy deserved
a persistent cough, a slug that snuck
into his cell and soft tissue,
a conspiracy like Epstein.
COVID-19 flavored Ramen noodles.

I wanted to be a gypsy curse.

A drowning on dry land.
Self-defense that isn’t ninety pounds
praying over my niece and nephews.

An inconspicuous bowl of soup.

Morty Horse

He lurks at the edge of a blue shadow,
can cast a darkening indigo shape that is a dagger.
In hours

when sunlight is welcome silence,
a kiss that lingers cold, descending,
the loneliest leave.

Morty, a statue of knight can cry if it rains.
Can move
if the queen thinks his L shaped hoof is a quiet ally.
Will only
try out his marble vocal chords at the coming dusk

when crickets crawl around his base,
lizards hurry over the cool curvature of his face
to something that can hold warmth,
the crevices in the concrete.

Morty wishes to shrink with them into them,
be eaten by them,
to keep moving, because the moonlight skittering
is better than being canvas
that can’t cough, a candle with no flame,

white reflection that says so much
and never says anything.

No Basura

We look down on our bodies becoming
dumpsters and the way we are
less selective of our preferences
if we experience any pain.

We condone illegal dumping
because boundaries give us
anxiety. Google says we have

codependence disease. Childhood
relationships are a catch twenty-two—all we want
is love, but we’re allergic. Not enough

to kill us or even for EpiPens.
It’s a delayed response;
the cause is an invisible
nuisance,

poor families in the early morning
toting their garbage to businesses before work
because thirty extra dollars a month is too much
for trash service; their babies are hungry.

Angry shop owners spray paint,
NO TRASH—NO BASURA on their sides,
install cameras, post prosecution signs.
They are empty threats. They imply neglect.