You Are Going to Kill My Mother

I guess a pandemic’s a time
to get wasted. I want to, too.
Badly. But crowds are universes
of a billion universes,
complex ecosystems in each
of us too small to see.
Most years I squeeze
into the tightest space
to buy the cheapest beer.
But Mom sells colognes
to the relentless public
at the mall, still pointlessly
open.

One of you knows someone
who knows someone
who wants to go out and
smell like sandalwood tonight.
And in the trillions of
tiny transactions we
do not know
happen each time
we step outside,
the actual virus
will make its way
into my mother’s
lungs. When
she– in her mid-
sixties– has to go
to the hospital,
but there’s no
availability
anywhere
anymore
to treat her,
I’m going to
remember what I saw:
you in a crowd at a bar
on your Instagram
stories. And I am
going to blame you.

 

(originally published in American Writers’ Review, Summer 2020)

My Employment History as Jenga Game

                         I see the opening
                                  can’t breathe
                                                 when placing down
                                        the block–
                                                                    one wrong move
                                     and I’m living in my car again.
                            Cheaper rent. The simpler things–
                                       brick house,
                                                   blue tuxedo–
                                             were romantic once
                            but my mouth is full of blood, teeth
                                                                       falling
                                                                                 out,
                                    my stomach yellow-splotched
                                                             (but not from sun).
                                 The rocks in my shoes,
                                                         holes in my
                                                                         wallet,
                                                   ripped nets my lovers fall
                                                                                     through
                                                       (rely on me?
                                                                           They know
                                                           I grind my teeth in sleep).
                                 How summery it was to think I could
                                        make the next job work, mountains
                                                                  of manila folders
                               perpetually stacking, tumbling–
                                                  the dim light’s exit blocked
                                                              from collapse.

(originally published in Stickman Review, Fall 2020)

In Another Life I Am Content Enough

What simulation’s numb you ask
if I want children this time

definitive we boil Kraft mac
and cheese. I toss our meager sweet

potatoes in oil and ramble about financial
self-worth the oven nearly at four hundred

degrees. I can’t stop petting your shoulder
the ashy cat roams in the loam of our love

our newly swept hardwood the house
our home for now so limited already

steam from the inside a pressure
cooker of different timelines. What river

these converging lives to seek meaning
in the biological job postings some of us

are born to call. My dad was sixty-one
when I was born my grandfather clock

ticks nonexistent. We have gorged in all
our broken cabinets to rustle the blue

plastic grocery bag pile. I can’t stand
to live another day preoccupied.

(originally published in Flights, Summer 2021)

2.16

I can’t talk about money I have none
      I am green in love in the black in life

the debt of my ancestors I am
      someone’s deficient ancestor

though my family is dying
                    one at a time deeper

into ground and deeper into soil
                    the sound of my sister

sobbing though she can’t be here
                    at the funeral she would if

she could
                    there’s always next time

(originally published in Ariel Chart, Winter 2021)

Coca-Cola Commercial

If I live a modest life I won’t know what it means
when the pipes burst or the banks bust. Either means
money I don’t have. Meat the Earth has. I’ve wanted
to travel but I know airplane fuel results in polar bears
dying on dry soil. Think Coca-Cola commercials with
the Arctic night preternaturally night. No snow, no
snow, and after airtime you crave Coke.

(originally published in Quince Magazine, Fall 2020)

Past 4 A.M. at Pizza King

wasn’t that how life
was supposed to go?
ah, college followed

the whims of fun.
it turns out I stayed out
too late in its shadow

and now capitalism
is the only one
who wants me to follow.

he says
you’re thirty now
so have some drinks

and pizza
if you want
dab the grease

with a napkin first
but don’t limit
yourself to one

 

(originally published in children, churches, and daddies, Fall 2019)

Late-Stage Capitalism

Worth inextricably tied to the throttle
I am unable to press forever and
ever, amen, where to lie
down and get some rest? Hallelujah,
livin’ by the bottle without drinking
anything alcoholic, not tonight
at least, not before the long drive
to work, paved highways, praise,
hell on the range is to pay
all your bills at once
and wait a month.

(originally published in Los Angeles Review of Los Angeles, Summer 2022)

Interview with Marissa at Panera

Sitting across the small table in the company of bagel
art and clanking dishes transported from trash to the back,
she asks no questions about what I’d bring to this table,
just asks about my experiences working with The New
York Times and making ends meet in studios by the sea
in southern California, how different that life was,
how, starting Friday, I’ll make a good delivery driver

 

(originally published in The Literary Nest, Spring 2019)

The Busier the Kitchen the Filthier the Dishes

Your lunch spot becomes a haven on the ground
level of a tower between towers on rainy workdays.

Your eyes strained at the sight of a waterfall
of text and maybe you missed
an important error in copy
marketed to clients. Here, though,

the dishwasher sprays a thousand plates,
aiming spouts at cheese stains hardened
from sitting by the garbage in
the place where discarded trays should be.

Water pressure removes ceramic sin
eventually, an industrial machine
humming in silver efficiency,
skin rinsed beside it.

Glasses that pass the spot test emerge,
steam rising, but meat lodged between
prongs is wrestled out with wet finger.

Your fork drips from the steak
just in a salesman’s mouth.

 

(originally published in Stickman Review, Spring 2018)

Advertising

I have been inside
a marketing firm
with its own basketball court.
Uninspired employees huffed
then daggered meaningless
the hoop, hoping for renewal,
but no one kept score.
I could relate:
attending Catholic school,
I found it necessary
to ask for forgiveness
in the shower.
I had come to fear
a red-fanged Satan
sporting a porn ‘stache
waiting by the mirror,
covering himself with
a towel, fork in hand–
and me, behind childhood
curtains covered in soot,
water rushing, my body
seal-like from ablution.

(originally published in Sooth Swarm Journal, Summer 2018)