no one reads bedtime stories in
cusco, there is no numb preservation of
old heroes, no myths–
maybe because it was built on older gods and they have died
the air chokes the lungs and it rains in a hapless way
(as if to pass the time)

the days go like this
we wake at 4, eat one free meal
have a few beers
find a line, do a line
do so many lines, get impossibly high
and then peter out sadly and disoriented when there's no more to find.

I'll look back on these three weeks as simpler times
with good friends in a bad city, fighting in a way what
can never be changed.
these gods have died.

dear cusco: stop shaking old bodies, cities should
grow, but you tear yourself up,
trying to find something below:
dig up shards of spent ghosts.
lay them out in a thin white row.