maybe when my fingers aren't bruised

I saw your parents’ car parked outside the gas station six afternoons ago and wondered nothing about you, I remembered those days when arsenic formed in the back of my throat whenever someone said your name and, and today I can’t remember what poison tastes like. I remembered wishing you were something I could forget and realized I couldn’t say which side of the bed you prefer to sleep in.

I remembered grinding my teeth the night you said you didn’t love me anymore but I can’t remember loving you and I am not sorry.

For Vera

tarantisms:

A Silvio le faltaba el dedo meñique de la mano izquierda
y en los domingos contaba las hojas de el limonero en el patio
de la catedral en la esquina de Lopez Mateos y la segunda.
Los Jueves, cuando salía de la clase de rezos,
con la biblia abajo del brazo derecho y la blusa abrochada
hasta el cuello y los zapatos lustrados y negros,
se sentaba debajo de el almendro en el parque de su
escuela y contaba las semillas caídas en el lodo.
No le digas a nadie,
Silvio esta estudiando los árboles
para que le crezca el dedo como sus flores.

For flowers-instead-of-faces

tarantisms:

Do you remember the day the gypsies came through town?
I dreamt of a purple hill each night since then,
found red wild seeds in my tea,
sang with the morning birds, and
realized I had no memory of your face.

The day the gypsies came through town
you were coughing up regret and blood,
lying to yourself about your old bible,
crying salty toxic tears, and in all your memories
they replaced all those teethy smiles
with flowers on their faces.

For Kate

tarantisms:

It’s not “katherine”
it’s kate
just kate

It’s kate who scribbles down
enough poems and thoughts
the fingers in her right hand
are not blistered anymore,
it’s calloused skin that reminds
her there are another thousand
words she did not say about
how repugnant a boy’s hands
can be.

It’s kate who can’t hold her
liquor well and it shows in the
kisses she gives out to those
who will receive them.
Lately it’s been the lips who resemble
the pair that she can’t kiss who
are on the other end of the kissing.
she won’t call you tomorrow.

It’s not just kate,
it’s kissing kate, too.

today is
and it is without you

so when the day comes
where it is
you and full of you

i will breath your
essence in
keep it deep down
the bottom of my lungs

and save it for
a day that is
and it is without you

Two Facts on Nicotine Dependence
(and proof I am a fire hazard)
By: Ana O.

Over half of smokers quit by adulthood.
I light cigarettes as frequently as flies die by your mom’s porch in east baton rouge. The bugs that did live kept me awake through the sweaty nights and your mom knew. Her nightdress grazed our bedroom door and her soft footsteps were my queue to meet her in the dark woods. She walked in front of me, her bare feet gently stepping over the grass and the mud and the thin hairs on the rocks at the bottom of the river. The moon rays that shone off her long gray hair made all the bugs dizzy and we sat with our feet in the water to watch their wings touch the fog on the ground. After she found the tree with the thickest trunk we drank the thawed mist on its leaves and I forgot what adulthood meant. I doubt I will be an adult able to resist the need for a cigarette when remembering the Louisiana brume in your mother’s eyes.

If you quit by the time you are thirty your lungs will look no different than a non-smoker’s.
Does one inherently reach adulthood by turning thirty? If I quit binge drinking by the time I am thirty will my liver be as rusty as that of a non-drinker’s? My bones and prayers will still be crooked even if adulthood was to come holding the hand of a pair of pink lungs, won’t they? Will it matter if my lungs are clean when the walls of my trachea are scarred and torn? Is it a big difference for the insides of my veins to be lined with regret than for my lungs to be full of dust? My lungs can be saved from the tar stains but can my innocence be saved from adulthood before thirty?

 victoriousmurphy answered: I love you, Ana. You’re beautiful, your voice is beautiful, your words are beautiful. You’re the greatest.

Ken, i love you and you’re making me tear up.

I forgot your name
how to pronunce the secrets sleeping
in the back of your moth eaten molars

I forgot the sound
how to shut it off- the tick, ticking
of my essence falling into your sheets