is this foundation
made of
salt or sand?
either one ground
between my teeth
hurts
& demands

either one
duned against
the curb
succumbs

everything in its path

no geometry
no math
can undo
the backlash

may the stars
grant us grace

may they forgive us
because we **** at

existing

the strangest
thing

the dust never settles
it compounds and
pounds on my door

(like)

wine that’s
been decanted
only to be poured
on the floor

i don’t know how
to unmaster the
lock

fumbling with keys
upon keys
i keep circling the
same block

always back to
the porch light’s
warm glow

from a home
i’ll never
(again) know

the villain in
this story
he exists to
sustain her
glory

(all the while)

she fills
her chalice
staining them
(all)
with regret
& malice

i saw a man
who held a garden
in his hand

i watched his
skin break open
like a plot of land

fractured root
sprouting into stem
a bead of blood &
the blossom began

tiny tomato
then two
spiderwebbed
in twine
a pepper grew

the sun shone
(too) brightly
that summer

a culling

razor wire
across the
dermal plane

“bring out
your dead”
she said
her cart
overflowing

i saw him look
back one last
time with
tired eyes

he witnessed a

poison apple
devoured
seeds and all
a new harvest
and a curtain call

as he was wheeled
away he thought
“i once held a
garden in my palm”

&
when the soil
encased him
he recalled
a living room fire
echoes
of a warm
song

Every cell a living thing. Boundless ripples of autonomy. My cell is venom. Birthed to sting. No form of evolution will twist me into something good. Fang me up and set me free. I poison everything. If the universe could shift and reverse. Maybe then I’d find my home. Slurped back into the infinite. A place before the bang of time. Where absolute chaos was not my design.

our love was a gaff
a two-headed calf
suckling on the monotony

i laughed
uncontrollably
as you clipped my wings

the irony is
i’m a jackalope
a prickly freak

the velvet of
my antlers
is powdered &
shedding
onto the apple
of your cheek

a masterpiece
                     of grief

It almost went unnoticed
The 10,000 stones you
Bouldered upon me
Kind of a weird flex
I thought as my
Shoulders cracked
Within the breath
Of that thought
A new thought
Actually no
I breathe
And say
“No”

I like to call this thought the
Great Unencumbering
As I take your hands
And move them
Very very very
Far from me
I’m talking 10k
Miles away
Just gone
With a
No

A great power I hold
One that you will
Never ever
Own