brother-in-lawsâ
misplaced rage- even past the stories your grandmother tells
you of the broken arm, the lost baby, her move across country.
it will be so far away youâd damn near think youâre in heaven
b u t n o, itâs a beach. florida, to be exact. now, youâre a business woman,
a smar t woman, even. a woman who will ask a co-worker out.
when he h old s you down in a hotel room, your fighting
arms flapping at the air, at his face, flailing, flailing sound like
( yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes )
he will tell you that your body, your body, said yes.
even then, you still havenât turned on yourself to
recognize the spectacular beast the world has truly been.
not yet. no. you finally wonder if you are indeed crazy
when the women you have taught yourself to love,
who have let you believe there is a safety, somewhere,
are suspicious of how you got back to them.
they ask only one thing.
why didnât you run?
58
Hammerstrike flintlock we explode out the gate.
So this is what it means to begin, to sprint towards
something. We d i d n â t kn o w about discipline then.
We had w affle i rons. We were vulca n ize d . We
stayed away from the jetstream, the inauthentic air.
That throb in our feet meant this year will be different.
Weâve got a heart and two entire lungs in
our feet. Skin stretched, staggered around them
in a gradient pattern. We want to see a ribcage. We
want to see a rollcage. We want to negotiate the
working parts, to hear in our sockets, our joints,
the s na p ping into plac e . Our bodies l a celoc k ed,
secured with det cord. We want to burn without impact,
to feel breeze as it fans the flames, to grip cassis
with our fingers, neon green, total orange. We want
force and weâll get it. This is Boomtown. Everyone
runs. And weâre not sure if itâs even healthy anymore,
the running, because we accuse each other of
avoidance but our accusations are made over our
left shoulders as we run away from us. Bombs are
being sent through the mail these days. Oklahoma
City exploded. What is it about human beings that
make us capable of explosion? We canât get away
from the word. When we are athletes, we explode
off of the line. A blue-brimmed man with
a stopwatch compliments us on our burst. We donât
say anything. We drink Iced Tea Cooler Gatorade
out of paper cups and nod our ch in s to wards other
people. We try to look cool but we know that what
we did was displace particles. Thank the neon bubble
that reads 25 PSI. Thank the gentle circulation of air,
for the fir s t time f o refront. Thank the thi ng s we
are running away from.
59
It was a month of
sitting hunched on the hot stoop,
banjo-eyed and breathless and
smoking cigarettes incessantly,
each one more rancid and perfect
than the one before
I met any of you drears who
hijacked my moon and
gave me street light s,
offered me elbows
when I wanted wrists,
ran like rabbits when
I bared my teeth, and
closed doors just before
I locked them and laughed.
Before any of this,
I was a grinning nimbus
perched on the prickly concrete,
nursing my sun-singed skin
and smelling smoke.
60
There was gunpowder in the tea that morning
we wanted to feel flame in our throats
and hear it in voices
I am not a child ranting
I am in between the depths of fears
and peaks of all that you said could wait
no one knows what I keep behind my eyes
Sometimes I come back to a deadbolt darkened
you never gave me a key
and sometimes you try to sleep in my bed
as if able to be closer through scent and linen
and in the morning you wake
to tell me itâs not all my fault
but I should remain outside
You claim to sleep to dream
I sleep to remember
my residue sits in your lungs
when the liquid leaves your throat
and you try to dream for a few hours
in foreign fibers of me
Do you remember that gashing without clot
a knee at a peak of injury
and how
misplaced rage- even past the stories your grandmother tells
you of the broken arm, the lost baby, her move across country.
it will be so far away youâd damn near think youâre in heaven
b u t n o, itâs a beach. florida, to be exact. now, youâre a business woman,
a smar t woman, even. a woman who will ask a co-worker out.
when he h old s you down in a hotel room, your fighting
arms flapping at the air, at his face, flailing, flailing sound like
( yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes )
he will tell you that your body, your body, said yes.
even then, you still havenât turned on yourself to
recognize the spectacular beast the world has truly been.
not yet. no. you finally wonder if you are indeed crazy
when the women you have taught yourself to love,
who have let you believe there is a safety, somewhere,
are suspicious of how you got back to them.
they ask only one thing.
why didnât you run?
58
Hammerstrike flintlock we explode out the gate.
So this is what it means to begin, to sprint towards
something. We d i d n â t kn o w about discipline then.
We had w affle i rons. We were vulca n ize d . We
stayed away from the jetstream, the inauthentic air.
That throb in our feet meant this year will be different.
Weâve got a heart and two entire lungs in
our feet. Skin stretched, staggered around them
in a gradient pattern. We want to see a ribcage. We
want to see a rollcage. We want to negotiate the
working parts, to hear in our sockets, our joints,
the s na p ping into plac e . Our bodies l a celoc k ed,
secured with det cord. We want to burn without impact,
to feel breeze as it fans the flames, to grip cassis
with our fingers, neon green, total orange. We want
force and weâll get it. This is Boomtown. Everyone
runs. And weâre not sure if itâs even healthy anymore,
the running, because we accuse each other of
avoidance but our accusations are made over our
left shoulders as we run away from us. Bombs are
being sent through the mail these days. Oklahoma
City exploded. What is it about human beings that
make us capable of explosion? We canât get away
from the word. When we are athletes, we explode
off of the line. A blue-brimmed man with
a stopwatch compliments us on our burst. We donât
say anything. We drink Iced Tea Cooler Gatorade
out of paper cups and nod our ch in s to wards other
people. We try to look cool but we know that what
we did was displace particles. Thank the neon bubble
that reads 25 PSI. Thank the gentle circulation of air,
for the fir s t time f o refront. Thank the thi ng s we
are running away from.
59
It was a month of
sitting hunched on the hot stoop,
banjo-eyed and breathless and
smoking cigarettes incessantly,
each one more rancid and perfect
than the one before
I met any of you drears who
hijacked my moon and
gave me street light s,
offered me elbows
when I wanted wrists,
ran like rabbits when
I bared my teeth, and
closed doors just before
I locked them and laughed.
Before any of this,
I was a grinning nimbus
perched on the prickly concrete,
nursing my sun-singed skin
and smelling smoke.
60
There was gunpowder in the tea that morning
we wanted to feel flame in our throats
and hear it in voices
I am not a child ranting
I am in between the depths of fears
and peaks of all that you said could wait
no one knows what I keep behind my eyes
Sometimes I come back to a deadbolt darkened
you never gave me a key
and sometimes you try to sleep in my bed
as if able to be closer through scent and linen
and in the morning you wake
to tell me itâs not all my fault
but I should remain outside
You claim to sleep to dream
I sleep to remember
my residue sits in your lungs
when the liquid leaves your throat
and you try to dream for a few hours
in foreign fibers of me
Do you remember that gashing without clot
a knee at a peak of injury
and how
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