i.

In the must of the DMV, do your eyes 
find the exits when they call your name? 
Do you ever forget your name has this

unsevered growth? Do you hear the part 
of you that is his and plan to brace your
body differently for fist or open hand?

You gave him a place to stay when 
his mother was violent and his father 
drowning. You say that by now this name

is part of you—does that scare you? 
Is it more of a coat or a spleen? A scab 
or a mouth? Do you worry one day

you will be curling your eyelashes 
in the mirror and catch whatever look
in his eye finally let you leave?

That you’ll chastise the grandkids 
and find the same click of the tongue, 
throat vibrato? When you’re scolding

yourself for burning the muffins 
or letting the mashed potatoes get chunky, 
what name does that small voice play?

The mother’s funeral he made you miss. 
Withheld keys, purse, money, permission, 
said, You need to stay with me right now.

ii.

God knows a name change is expensive. You’ll do it

next month when the air conditioner is up and working.

You’ll do it next spring when the cruiser stops shedding parts.

The grandkids are hungry and eggs just keep getting

more expensive. The scripture says separation is wrong

but maybe you found a small loophole: a missing passage

that says there’s an exception for men with a curdled heart;

says if you keep the name, God might just not notice.

iii.

When your husband led the congregation, the women 
awed at his love for you, the men hid their jealousy,

the children followed you down the aisle toward 
Sunday school. You taught them of humility, but

how pride is not always wicked. You helped. You honored. 
You sang the hymns and when you cried at the altar,

they said Look what God has done. When you 
cried at the altar, he put his hand on your back. When

you cried at the altar, he curled his fingers on the small 
bones of your shoulder and said you should be proud.

En una habitación oscura, el universo me llamaba

Yo era como un pájaro de atardecer 
que bailaba electropop histéricamente
y gritaba por dentro: “¿Cuándo termina esto?”
“¿Por qué no me estrello contra una ventana y ya?”

Tú eras como una lluvia de diamantes
y estabas a 650 millones de kilómetros de mí
pero lo suficientemente cerca como para preguntarme:
“hey, little morra, do you want to see some of my magic?”

Siempre tuviste algo de mago charlatán,
pero alguien tenía que sorprenderse cuando, 
estando en una habitación oscura que bien pudo haber sido tuya o mía o el universo entero, 
convertías el metano en carbono, y el carbono en grafito, y el grafito en pequeñas piedras brillantes que se fundían en uno de tus mares.

En una habitación oscura (que bien pudo haber sido tuya o mía o nuestra), el universo me llamaba
y tú jugabas con el estado de la materia
y yo bailaba electropop como pájaro suicida
y una radiación electromagnética del principio de los tiempos me decía:
“Mi corazón nunca sentirá, nunca verá, nunca sabrá”.

* * *

In a dark room, the universe was calling me

I was like a sunset bird
who was dancing electropop hysterically
and who was yelling inside: “when is this over?”
“why don’t I crash against a window and that’s it?”

You were like a diamond rain
and you were 650 millions of kilometres away from me
but close enough to ask me:
“hey, little morra, do you want to see some of my magic?”

You always had something of charlatan magician
but someone had to be amazed when, 
being in a dark room that could be yours or mine or the entire universe, 
you were turning the methane in carbon, and the carbon in graphite, and the graphite in little shining rocks that were melting in one of your seas.

In a dark room (that could be yours or mine or ours), the universe was calling me
and you were playing with the state of matter
and I was dancing like a suicidal bird 
and an electromagnetic radiation from the beginning of times was telling me:
“My heart will never feel, will never see, will never know”.

yes, i’ll admit to watching you 
in the courtyard, from the balcony: 
the way you lean into your sword 
on the whetstone, and the way you lean 
into me.

your father thinks the only man to lay you down
on the thick moss will have a knife in your gut. 
bring your neck here, bring your chest here.
tell him these are sparring bruises.

here the pine needles will fall 
on us one by one, & our fingers will curl
like roots around each other as they grow.
by morning i will scrub my hands raw
pulling sap from your cloak.

over the city wall the smoke churns
and rises like the gray limb
of a revenant. man made fire.
when the last ember sputters, coughs, winks out
the trees will be as god turned them from clay.

i mark the aging of my personal cadaver 
by the amount of holidays i’ve spent 
with you and not my parents. so far it’s
four. i’m supposed to end this and i can’t
when we ablate our idiosyncrasies into 
syncopation i can’t when we make that no
go bag plan to meet in the middle i can’t 
when shit hits the fans at yankee stadium 
don’t you see there’s an arc in all this
nonsense. i hold an image of you like the
redhead on the subway with a magnifying
glass i told you i would not chase or read you
under separate cause anymore. i thought 
now, i wouldn’t be able to draw you with 
your own words anymore. maybe that’s true.
i don’t make wishes on your breath anymore.
we can’t lose – who? – anymore. i’ve never
exhausted so much of my own worth on
someone who needed to be told. when the
L speeds under the river and it rains
you can see the pause in the droplets. i
paused along droplets. i shed a lot of water.
the umbrella a young boy uses as a gun, cocks
it accurately and snipes. you rung me like
a sponge and had no idea how dry we’d get.
i didn’t either. i didn’t know how bad it would
become. i realized i’d rather trust you than
love you i’d rather have all of you than no
sun i deserve that shine we deserve that 
ease like it was before. i got diagnosed 
with real fucking conditions. i would like 
to move forward. i would like to find your
laugh as genuine again. it will probably take
some time. but this is a start. i tell you 
i do this with you and feel closer to you,
as my friend. …………. i smile. you agree. 
you settle. you smile. we kiss. i tell you you 
are my brother. we laugh. i am so slighted 
by the sun behind your head i make halos
with my pre cataracts and you tell me we 
will be there for each other in all types
of crisis 
and 
coups.

is the same summer in which I hear
“Orlando” and “Charleston” knowing
neither one of these cities were meant to be final resting places
but both hold stolen spirits.

It is the summer of attending two vigils for the same horror
because the first one didn’t do the community justice.
It is the summer of unrest.
The summer of another media erasure.
Of dancing around the words “hate crime”

There is something so bitter about leaving a vigil
three days after the tragedy we’ll call ‘Pulse’.
In which you are full of something
other than your own grief.
Only to awake the next mourning
to the anniversary of another mass shooting.
Another reminder of my own mortality

And is it not ironic that the day
after the day we call tomorrow
is one of celebration
of Black Independence
though this community has been struck
with more violence than peace
since being ‘liberated’.

Or how I wish to hold those I love close,
but realize that we’re safer across state lines
than congregated in a space made
sacred by our very existence?

My partner confesses she told me
she liked me after realizing that
by the time she thought it to be
the right time it could be too late
because I am both black and queer.
She tells me she realizes 

how each gathering for healing
could so quickly become a wake
in which we scream their names
and hope someone would say ours
even if just to hear their own voice
should any of us make it out alive

Yet, last night, I felt so alive
taking the risk of dancing
in the open with other
bodies and skin that looked like mine.
this radical form of healing.
Reclaiming the spaces they want
to destroy.

How in those moments
we forgot about the hurt
in our bones.
And could only exist in that which
we made holy.

A Found Poem from Google’s “America’s Most Misspelled Words” in 2017 by State

Today is a vacuum. 
Today is diarrhea 
and dilemma and 
Wisconsin
but somewhere
tomorrow is hallelujah 
and hallelujah 
and people. Tomorrow is 
surprise. Tomorrow there will be ninety 
special bananas. I 
can sense it but I know you think 
me a liar. I appreciate everything 
you find suspicious. 
I really can sense 
it. Be patient 
young chihuahua. Oh you, 
young giraffe. Tomorrow
is beautiful. Give license 
and sense to it. Tomorrow 
is like a diamond. Tomorrow 
there may be nothing 
but gray chaos and even that will be 
beautiful. Tomorrow is available.

It all started with a lie, being one place, but claiming to be elsewhere.
All I wanted was to to fill my social bucket, to satisfy the need to be leisurely with others.
There was music, there were smiles as wide as the sea,
You offered your bed to me.
I was naive enough to believe in the innocence of such offer,
I was drunk, I was tired.
I remember the silkiness of the sheets & the warmth of the blankets.
I remember dozing off.
You awoke me to ask if I minded you sleeping next to me.
I didn’t mind.
You crawled into bed as I scooted over.
I closed my eyes as I pulled the covers up over me.
The cadence of your breathing pattern soothed my being.
You put your arm around me,
My body quivered as if it were to split into pieces from the earthquake that is you,
The tectonic plates that are my skin shifted into hills of goosebumps.
Cuddling was okay, but I was nervous.
We were face to face.
I tried to control my breath,
Tried to control the static I felt in my limbs.
Our faces close, you kissed me.
I wasn’t prepared, I froze.
You kissed me harder, I kissed back, yet still frozen.
I wanted to sleep.
By now, the core of my being was filled with fear,
The canyon within me was flooding.
This went on & your hands began to search,
Searching for something that wasn’t yours.
My mind was a monsoon of ‘No’,
My stomach twisted,
& words, words did not exist.
I never spoke, never moaned, never gave a glimpse of affirmation.
I wanted to be free of this disaster, I wanted to go back in time and take my lie away.
I was told I was lucky. I was told “Oh he’s so attractive, I’m jealous”.
But I never asked for your storm,
I never asked to be frozen.

in new orleans i fall in love at least 4 times a year
i can’t be sure, 
i might do that anywhere.

i am sure that
there is always a puddle 
on broadway and oak. 
it sounds like the tide coming in 
when cars pass over it.

i know that you should
take some spanish moss with you 
it never dies.

i moved to new orleans when 
i was wondering what 
growing up felt like. 
it might be like 
concrete breaking 
from the roots of trees 
that are older than i’ll ever be. 
or it might be like when
all your friends say 
“i’m tired” 
and you can only be proud of them
for admitting it.

in new orleans i fall in love at least 4 times a day, 
i can’t tell if the wet on my skin 
is from my body or the air surrounding it,
it is probably definitely because of the heat.

They put a Target at the center
of town, circle inside of a circle
everyone & their mom is here
to be caught in the dollar section
to be caught in the crosshairs

Why are there no Walmarts in Iraq
because barber makes a bad joke
clipping his fellow patron

They put a Target at the center
of town, & beforehand in the paper
work when the town was still a village
& that lake in the hills where 
the people stayed stated

[ No persons except those of the
white caucasian race shall use, occupy or
reside upon any residential lot or
plot in this subdivision ]

They put a Target at the center 
of town, before the red circle
there was a redline
her lips pursed
those red eyes
that missing the mark
overpour spilling value down the aisle

Cut a checkstand
check yourself out
see something familiar, some fabric
or a friend and remember

They put a Target at the center
of town, for our convenience

Everything is here

You can buy a shower curtain
cheap wall ornament
cheap wrist watch
cheap fur coat
cheap welcome mat

They put a target at the center 
of town &
we brought our shopping lists

Daughter, the end of summer will always be a signal. You will never forget when spring was taken from your skin. Only the smokey smell of the season’s changing. The chill of the place his hands found. It is amazing how the body remembers. Like the trees after a forest fire, you will ache from a wound you place at the back of your mind. I also know what it’s like to feel empty. I can still remember the hollow absence of you in my womb. When I birthed you into the sun a girl. This was my mistake. I should have known how girls are plucked so easily from the Earth. How they are placed in vases. How their beauty is seen only as something to be owned. Even goddesses are not safe from assault. Every winter, I remember: How we danced. How we bloomed. How I held you in my arms and whispered “sweet girl” You most of all should never know how the world only holds you close enough to stab you. How any day may be the day you lose your limbs. How soon enough you will face yourself in the mirror and not recognize who you are. How can I prepare you for that? When you stumble back to me with stories of how his touch reminded you of death. How every year you feel like dying. How the sunlight no longer gives you warmth. How they will make a myth out of you and he will still sit on a throne. There is a reason they call me Mother. I am good at watching the things I love suffer. I exist only to watch the journey of my children as they stand painful in abandoned fields like stalks of withered corn. When you walked back from Hades and its darkness I made sure the sun would show you that hiding your pain from the light only kills you slowly. And I will tell you, Daughter that everything dies but it is never the end. Do not forget you are a goddess. That the sun is shining for you. Your skin is not a fruit he sank his teeth into, it is an orchard. Your body is not a withered stem, it is a rosebush. Every year may remind you, but never forget that above all else, you were made from this Earth. You are not a victim of it. I will mourn with you. I will show the world how to bend to your pain. To share your grief every time you are forced back into his bed. I will plant these seeds, kissing them like children and bury your pain in the dirt. Hands in the soil, feeling the flesh of your fruitfulness not as something to be stolen, but savored. Sweet girl, you are a survivor. You were made for greater things than the Queen of Death. And you will find them here. In the Spring.