Stray

The way the cat looked at me
                       after his treat–

         the difference was ours has a home.

And God I am so ashamed.

                          They are the same

but I was on our unfamiliar
       porch
             swinging

a bag of sustenance

           like unlimited pleasure

                you needed

                      for survival

 

(originally published in The Magnolia Review, Summer 2018)

Tiny Vodka Glasses

love is however many tiny
glasses of vodka we drank
and discarded

sun shards held those hands
of many folds

this little glass-dagger
carves the elegy of hummingbirds,
holds veins in my porous fingers

we sing the wooden desk
in the alley of deep potholes
our branchmouths stripped
of leaves but kindling flame

to scratch the words evenly
scrapes on the whitened palms
the lines intersect always
it is not simple to crumple
those tiny bedroom vodka sheets &
weave them neatly into garbage

 

(originally published in Loveliest – Issue #1)