on the last night
of the june breeze
that i spent tucked
between your hips
and my home
i heard
almost as faint
as a wing flutter
your tongue unfurled
the sounds of your streets
against my ear.

pavement hard but
sweet as a plum liquor

spelled out avenues that
have become rose pastures.
hoods that have
grown thick in themselves
with petals stained
of red rich violence
cross brown bones
but those bullets
bear no color.

taxi swift
yet city street thick

buzzing the sounds
of a place with half
the people
yet twice the traffic.
the kind of
tuesday twelve fifteen traffic
that i never understood
but you made action
where you lost sense.
dropped clips into the alleys
where the cops
wouldn't go
and pierced a limb
or two on the way.

cheeks filled with
with sticky bliss
bashed the demure
of downtown
cause the magnificent mile
ain't got ish
to the brick backbones
of them cook county temples
tourist tend to
trip past.

on my last night
here with you
i want to do
nothing more than wash
the windy city out of me
before state lines
baptize my view
of your anatomy.
pipe my gums
with this Crest
and brush your
taste out of me.

see big cities
have stained my tongue before.
new york is still in there
and i ain't even been there
in years.

i've caught tears
streamlining down
the crest of my cheek
at the taste
of chips of bay ridge
in my teeth.

so why don't
you just get lost?

the lingering lisp of your
shoreline sure does
last a tad
past welcomed.
matter of fact,
a tad past passed
two ticks before
your beach sands
sank my hips.
your lips have learned
too well
the outline of
my spine poured
against your banks boy.

so no thanks boy.
i don't want your tee shirt.
i don't need your silhouette
sketched in my memory
let alone my key chain.

and you keep saying
i'll be back
but i'll believe that
when i'm 30,000 ft up
straddling your boarder
by boeing.