I did not care for the woman at the gas station today.
I did not hug her.
Or, ask her about her day.
Nor did I ask about her husband.
I played the lotto and left.
I played the lotto and left.
A wasteland in and of itself, my smile has eaten me alive.
I know my father.
I know that he dreams of me.
There in his memories.
I am schlepped as a little girl
across his lifespan, together with his booze, his Bud-Light, snakes and spiders
we suffocate there, all together, altogether.
Their will to live is simultaneously remarkable and pathetic.
Living on to be resented or killed.
If I’m lucky, I’d likely choose the latter.
You like it there in the moonlight?
Ineligible deposits.
(Demanding.) Life for death.
Sometimes in public mourning riots.
It is very difficult to separate
Performance from funeral.
Resistance reduced to protest.
Embodied.
His is a useless Jesus.
I told her I liked her hair dyed yellow.
I go out ambitious.
With my corduroy replaced
velvet. I go out
sometime, mid-January, felted,
immodest in my—
seldom—
do I go out.
When I go out
my heart slides sad.
I should have just driven to the airport alone.