April 2024

The sun was losing
a long gold tooth

on the linoleum
of the labor and delivery ward.

I lifted my plastic bracelet to the green eye
of the barcode gun and it sang

the first note
of money’s national anthem.

Redeem, a word with its feet
in the cement block

of bribe, of buy. Each Tylenol,
a tiny egg in the nest

of the nurse’s …

Some bequeath poetry.
Some bequeath hats.
Tomes of my sorry
hats can destroy
libraries.

readying it for my lover’s dinner, I remembered
my abuela slashing the rooster’s throat. I was four.
Held the wet blade in my hand and cried. For days
the carcass hung like a cross over the red front door
until it shriveled and stunk, turned gray as dried petals.
Abuela said don’t cry. She said be fearless & god-fearing
as any white…