My chest is made of copper
Like all fourth generation Arizonans.
Strong, sturdy, homegrown.
Like every ancient thirsting saguaro
That 18 year old Scottsdalers watch
Flying by their car passenger window
In mid-August, going to Tucson,
The ***** T. Baja, U.S.A.
To experiment with bisexuality
And pursue a liberal arts degree.

Looking into storefront windows
I see your silhouette
Always next to me, facing me
And if I could make out the picture
A little clearer
And you weren’t just a shadow
I know
You’d have that same **** sad look
That always gets me
And I’d ask you
“Are we still not done with all this?”

I was sober
Until
Your hand
Grazed mine

Watching Ridle Baku takes me back
To cobblestone streets
Strangers speaking in mysterious, angry accents
Asking, “bist du Amerikaner?”
Ja.
A few blocks separated us,
A chain and barbed wire fence
And MP’s wielding machine guns
But on Saturday’s my parents took me out to the market
And I wonder if we ever passed by each other
Two children in the same city
The city was yours, is yours.
I was just a tenant.
Standing in ancient shadows.
I never knew Arizona didn’t have castles
Until I left, and I missed them.
I got a Mainz 05 scarf when I was 18.
A year before I watched you play for them,
And score against Leipzig.
And the city cheered.
Your city cheered.
And all at once I realized how much I loved Mainz
And how badly I wanted to call Mainz home.
How badly I wanted the city I grew up in to feel like home.

You’ll **** yourself up, you will, you know it.
Staring at paintings of purple women,
Through indifferent eyes; flames will be lit
Just so you may feel something. And what then?

You, you, you, and the cross you say you bear.
Not nailed, but rather tied, fettered, and bound
To the wood by splintered brown and blonde hair,
Severing with a cracking, moaning sound.

Love is written large across your stomach; 
Not your heart, not your lips, nowhere it should.
Nowhere protected from the candle’s wick.
Nowhere it can turn into something good.

When it’s time, find bravery in your chest.
Do not fight it, just burn with all the rest.