But by then, my hand, moved by such
sudden peace, might panic and smother
your otherwise cool breast, keep
its eager, swollen eye from seeing
this world.

You have fought for so long that you can recognize the warrior
in water. No part of it is soft but it is not harsh. You are powerless,
enveloped and entered. You are sinking and you are bodiless.

A boy wakes up in the middle of the night with nothing
but the shirt on his back and the crayon in his pocket. It’s 1979.
There are no cell phones, no computers, no VCRs, no cable.
Just the illusion of freedom, raw talent, and time to kill.

Would he know he was living in the universe
where no one plays fair
where the prom queens
and cheerleaders die?

and I want to return your affection for a moment
to the small girl who peers into the spin

cycle of her mother's washing, who loves the movement
of clothes against the quick circumference within

My neighbor once told me that when you put a dog down you will want to walk
into the nearest intersection and of course that is true. Not many know the sound
of a skull being crushed but there are some people who know.

But when you look up again
mandible gears collapse the door,
and the nurse steps into the space
behind the light.

her lips curl around the candy red-striped straw like they would curl around any straw; in a pouty lip-gloss pucker (get your head out of the gutter!). or maybe sex was a 50s invention altogether, when the storks went on strike.

The laws of physics dictate that a compound can not
change from one form to another.
Certainly there must have been warrants out for my arrest.

He’s going
to scrub, save two lives, plugging his ears
to muffle the somber music of Man cutting into Woman

Fist out of mouth, design absent alignment

when four lanes strip to one and then none

paved a stoned passenger’s premature exit.

nobody left at the playground
the afternoon
just burning
through your fingers
like a cigarette

Will these neglected letters bruise?
He can’t bear read what they said.
The dead decay—unable to move

let my posts and selfies

decay like every other
stretch of skin

on this algorithm.