Confessions

I try to be good 
I try to talk to God inside my head 
because maybe the silence is really just 
the heater humming on 
I love Love, I want to be loved
so I close my eyes and breathe in the music 
the mist after the rain
the promise of bodies coming clean 
only to be rewound tighter than before
I think I am too much sometimes 
crawling home so late 
in the half-born dawn 
dreaming about 
fingers fishing for the jewel and vanilla crushed 
between eager teeth 
and watercolor motions
I wish I grieved strangers less
and talked to my grandparents more
I take too long in the shower
because the other worlds are 
too cold 
I only tell the truth when I’m drunk 
or waist-deep in a poem 
so look me in the face
without blinking and feel my words
in your soul
I am made of the wanting 
to be believed, to be crystallized
into prayer
I am the one at the end
of the tunnel, long way down
blind groping for heat in a bathroom stall
I wonder if homeland is just
a hungry mouth above a heartbeat
a room opening inside an animal 
for another animal
We are all here, packed tight like bullets
tawny gold and terrified 
of growing dust 
of never breaking the needy flesh
of answering the call only to hear 
our own voice groaning back

Hymn to the LES

There is nothing more glorious than being 
on the run. Friday night, I switch my teeth out 
for blades, zip my body into something tight, 
unroll the eons of waiting. Smoke, a hefty illusion, 
places her soft hands around my neck. 
Still, I walk feverish into the street. In the corner, 
up against a wall, men pull their pants down 
with sighs of relief. They are almost beautiful, 
if not terrifying. I don’t know what to make of 
this world, ballooning out before me, miles and miles 
of starless black sky, and the sound of distant laughter, 
and the rage that speaks within. The strange neon rooms 
glowing above, either prison or sanctuary. 
The thud of bodies on bodies, maybe death or 
desire. I carry my legs light and wade into the 
sticky water. I could swallow the disco moon  
if I wanted to.