Scream, throw yourself to ***** cement
take off your shoes
you want to pull away strips of skin
to reveal what’s really just
lonely little pieces of people you’ve tried on like hides.
You are two parts animal
paw at tree trunks
marking territory, yours all
yours.
Pull up dandelions,
look around for the killer
Paws trembling, sending shockwaves
through cracked dirt.

Laugh, throw your head in my lap
take off your shoes, braid my hair
We walk down south main and
you want to give all your money to a homeless man
you know he
could just as easily be you.
Torn pants, clinging to a cigarette pack like a lifeboat
No, you only want to be a vagabond on the stage
fling your voice to the crowd, keep their gaze.
dance with your arms outspread, yours all
yours.
make love with a glance,
sway your hips to reveal
hibiscus from your palms, the sort of deep
red  I can almost taste.

Bite your tongue until it bleeds
clench your brow, run bare foot
through paths winding like scars.
Lick your lip, looking for traces of sea salt
find it there, smile like there’s nothing better
than bittersweet

Know that when the dust settles
I will sit with you
and watch
the animal teach the boy
how to survive in the wild.

Cats cry as classical music plays
and furniture floats in some box far off
We hold our heads low, only hands move
to roll down windows while leaving
a place we never called home.

California, did you feel me reach for you
between heaving breaths as father
passes Main Street toward the highway?
and mama smiles, cringes, throws her
chest forward
Merge for incoming traffic but there
isn’t anyone else on the highway
headphones like blindness or alternate
realities where mama and I are not just an expense.

Pennsylvania and Super 8 Motel
Where we rush in carrying the cats
in towels to make them look like laundry
not having enough to pay the pet deposit
red brown bed covers- bad blood
between mother and father
as they cannot agree on a tv station
miles to go and
everyone sighs and sips at their excitement

Stop at an exit toward a hotel without a pool
in Nebraska
where people take their drink dry
or ***** or depressed
mama and papa get one on the rocks
with stares and snots from men wearing
cowboy hats and desperately fat belt buckles
papa imitates a gay man
mama is confused
dust for $85 a night
two travelers, one to return
headed for gold
but not for good

States run by with motive unknow
Dog rests her head on my lap as
we cross the line and I ask to
stand by the sign
both agree it is too dangerous
I weep and wish to open the doors
we do, and the air is different, like taking off a mask
I wanted to embrace the ground we now
walked on, with feverish kisses meant for the trees

Papa leaves and drives all the way back
with promises on his shoulders
while mama and I unpack boxes
silverware, bedsheets, posters
with the expectation of a return
that never happens

We collapse the boxes labeled fragile
open the shades, and stop waiting for
a man who isn’t traveling,
a place,
a destination.