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

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

Okay, picture this: We’re in an elevator. The elevator shuts down. It doesn’t matter where we’re going, only that we’re alone.

and then her eyes fully opened — blazed through with strands of mud

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

I tap at the alphabet while a single deer
taps at the dirt beyond the brush
on the far side of the tree line.

Even from this distance I could go out
the door it would bang shut and crumble

how does an afternoon turn
on its axis?

You are strange, my mother said, dwelling on the past.

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

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

Should have found a job by now; should have slept in the night;
should have boiled old coffee before noon.

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

here is the sky in stop motion, flickering,
a still shot in monochrome