He has stories that I am not in
anymore. It’s healed this way.

Part of being a good sad person
is always painting the shadows
in the right direction and knowing
what sorrow to art with.

It is the 70s. 1970s? 2570s? Who knows?
Audre and I have a penthouse in New York.

a folksome, gruesome opera
of gauze and malcontent.

The storm passes without snow.
The car waits loyally in the back lot.

I want to roll in this moment until I become its vocabulary
until I smell like the bones
until I am its echo…

Lights on the dashboard spell out
“You still can’t kiss me”

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.

Empty vessels
make the most sound, I think,
as you rip the fairy lights off the handrail.

I count my homes—
those of my scattered youth
the sanctuary of our young family
the intermittent rest stops
of apartments and vacations.

You let the yellow glow
from eye sockets. The building up the street
is burning faster and faster.

the man is stayed bent over the canvas
of my sofa. the man is me the man is him
self and I bring down the whip…

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

There is so little left of the tomato plants.

love is a soggy tea stain on a grocery receipt

In my universe, my arm carries a heart and flowers,
my back a misguided quote

Any still figure at mid-late evening, when the long shadows make even crumbs appear arranged like furniture.

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