The bird, they said, did many things.
My sister said it died, like our old one,
Fell unto the cage’s edge like a feather. And I suppose,
if it was picked up by my mother, it must
have been rigid and cold. But
My father, he said it had stopped eating,
and in a paramount effort to escape, grew thin, and
squeezed out from the cage.

Maybe    it succeeded.

I sat on your bed, boiling hot
Aching all over. I stared up at the
Stars we had plastered-together
On your ceiling.
Your hand touched your crotch-the mattress
Moved side to side, I just wanted your hand on
My forehead, words like: “You are the most
Beautiful girl I have ever known.” Although,
Had you made such a comment,

I would      not    have    believed    you.

I sat boiling hot, like in hell, sweat on my back, and on my
*******-but I did not want you to touch them.
So your hand grabbed at your crotch, I heard your moaning
As I sat comatose, still, waiting
As you pleased a biological extremity-a hungry and base
Instinct       to ***

You wouldn’t know, would you? About the slim man
You talk with at midnight-well, I know him. His name
Is Louis and once upon a time,
I watched him from my sixth floor apartment.
His name is Louis.
His name is Louis.
****, his name is Louis.

Avery        sat  across   the room in two classes
Of mine-starky, lean, and well       philosophical.
His brown eyes only scanned me         I was
Nothing     to him.
He always stormed in      just in time  
I’d think     he must be absent    today
But no       there he’d come,  tall    white    and well,
Alluring.
His bags all over the floor     how could he make
Mess look so       classy        so           elegant
****. He
Spoke with such   top-notch   diction   and
His voice-straight, methodical, structured
But perhaps the enchantment came from
His cedar-like after-smell    like Jewish markets
In the City. That rich, well-educated, cocky      smell.
Avery sat across the room, and read his writing

I read mine to him,    but
I was nothing
To him.

Living      Room

Here   we die    every day

If I tell you how much I weigh,  
the weight of my mind
the mass   of my body    and the burden
of my histories
or make you see    instead  
the weight of yours  
what will become of our children?
Will they  hold   all the things we hate
about ourselves most  
or will they be    sacred  

as all children
should be?

When I can  not direct my body to release
appropriately   I resort to dreams of a handsome
boy, a ******* addict at a motel whose sole purpose
is to please me    and somewhere in the narrative he
falls deeply in love with my zestful spirit,
and so, I embrace him   and I rub against him,
but somewhere here, the whole thing becomes
quite maternal
and I cannot recognize him as the
****** object of my desires
  
that is when I begin to write of him,
the texture of his skin, the ice in his eyes, the veins on his neck,
the girth of his manhood as he
lowers himself unto me and looks at me
desperately as if I am the goddess
that will give him all the riches of earth.