I don’t
know why
I’m in the garden
kneeling on dirt

There is so little left of the tomato plants.

We stop doing dishes while
a mile unwinds
from the tree outside.

the strands of your hair on the bathroom tiles aren’t sketching defeat. that’s you spitting disease in the face with another day you’ve woken up to.

Even as the sun warms the concrete
the long nights’ sensual cold lingers in my clothes.

a folksome, gruesome opera
of gauze and malcontent.

I would always rather be happy than
dignified. Rather held than held
in awe.

Long after midnight, we’re talking about our first time

You’ve spent a lifetime training
for this.

love is a soggy tea stain on a grocery receipt

you quit wearing pants
loaf around your yard
in hole-nipped panties

My grandmother asked, “Does it feel like being widowed?”

I buy too much, for someone of my stature.
could pawn a skinny metaphor to purchase a plump skin.
its reputed in our lineage— to daydream a life that shreds our pockets.

The sin is existing.

If America is Babylon / and you are an exile / newly arrived among pagans / Catholic, ‘Ngolan, Black, woman / you already know how to pray

Every so often, they add a tattoo
in honor of some long-forgotten love.