back on cement, maybe this is what they call hitting rock bottom;
black in night, thick tar poured into the mold of my cookie cutter heart
maybe you’ll take it if I offer it to you frosted this time.
and above me dangles a traffic light in the whipping wind,
maybe it’ll turn red and you’ll have to stop to see the girl
lying in the street where you left her
but it’ll be green like it always is and you’ll cruise
right on over me, skid marks tattooed on my legs:
by now, it’s permanent.
in my religion, we lie at Eden and Abbey, on pews facing the stars like
God preaches himself and I come every day, not only Sunday– oh, holy
is the intersection you pass through, parting me. and in your dust: a cross of my limbs.
you steal my salvation and take it– a rag to brush off sins
itching you like a parish of fleas.that pothole there I declare my grave. six feet deep under the
shrill beeping, squealing tires, profanities flung back and forth and I might just
monkey-in-the-middle and intercept one of yours. replay it like a broken record
or like you set off the car alarm but no one is shutting it up and it’ll
blare and so will I as I scream your name and startled
drivers will take lives– one by one by the flickering of traffic lights
until enough screams can play the orchestra of celebration
for when you drive by again.
