The Coma Button

Him—the Bag of Bones—and two cats. Burlap sack of a man. Cries with the rain and laughs with—oh, he laughed? He presses his wrinkled nipples, hoping for sleep. He is a tired Bag of Bones.

Our Christian (A Sestina)

In the dark,
she sits alone. She smells
incense. Hears the sound of a child’s laugh.
Grabs the rosary
from her pocket. It’s a sign,
she thinks. Blood

rushes to her head. For the life of the flesh is in the blood,
the preacher says in his dark
voice. She notices a sign
on the altar: BEWARE. Her perfume smells
like musk. As she fingers her rosary,
she forces a laugh—

her Momma’s laugh.
Mother Mary, who wept blood.
Momma, who gave her that rosary
ten days before falling asleep in the dark.
She visits Momma daily, smells
her decay, and understands it’s a sign

that Momma’s getting better. But Linda held the pen. Sign
here, Linda said. Linda smiled, but did not laugh.
Our Christian Funeral Home contains many smells,
Linda explained. Embalming fluid, copper, blood,
silver, nickel, death— She thinks of Linda and lets the dark
red beads of the rosary

drop to the Church floor. Fifty-nine prayers of the rosary
scatter. The preacher, holding Christ’s wine, falls and pulls down the altar sign.
Did it say BEWARE OF DOG? She didn’t know, it was too dark.
When he falls, the People laugh.
The altar is stained with His blood,
as well as the preacher’s, and now the Church smells.

She said, One day in a field of fifty-nine daisies, with smells
of pollen and sounds of bee’s wings, I will pray my mother’s rosary.
My temples will feel the pulse of my Saviour’s blood.
The heavenly clouds will give me a sign.
Joyous, I will laugh
and chase away the Devil in the dark.

She likes the way the blood of the Holy Ghost smells.
She searches in the dark for the fallen beads of her broken rosary.
She can read the sign now: BEWARE OF GOD. Where is the child’s laugh?

A Conversation

Once the porcupine asked the serpent, "What's your name?"
The serpent replied, "What's your game?"
Porcupine: "I'm in love with you."
The serpent: "My name is Larry."

Acknowledgment

Our fingers trembled for three minutes before they linked. Our relationship trembled for three months before it broke.

Leapfrog

Sometimes a frog leaps from lily pads covered in slime. Often, though, it stays still and talks. Not out of laziness or exhaustion, no. Hasn’t the need to leap, just the need to croak.

*

I see in a pond a frog jump from one lily to another to another. A frog talks in ribbits, but not to me. Covered in slime, it need not croak while it jumps. No other frogs around.

*

My friend says he ran over a frog with the lawnmower, says it jumped beneath while he wasn’t looking. No need to have leaped or croaked. Should have stayed still, I said. Its ribbits covered the lawn.

*

At night I dream of living from pad to pad. Unaware, until another frog sits on the next pad. So I croak and it goes away. I wake up and mow the front lawn, hearing a ribbit with each step I take.

*

But when toad croaks, the frogs know it is in disguise. His voice is deep like a pond. Toad is defensive and says he was born with it. The frogs believe him until his disguise covered in slime surfaces after the accident with a blade.

To Bitterness

You are the dark chocolate of emotion
Why I cannot fall asleep at night
I feel you tug at my eyebrows
At my eyelids
Reminding me why I should not be happy
My mother says “Be grateful for what you have”
So I am grateful
(Never wasting food)
And my grandmother says “Be thankful for what you have”
So I am thankful
(Thinking of the starving children in Africa)
But what of the things that I do not have
Like power and responsibility? Although-
I see you on the news and on the faces of Presidents
You are everywhere, bitterness,
Antithesis of sweetness
Even in my morning glass of orange juice

Dentistry

A dentist stands over his patient, picking at the man’s teeth with a probe.
My body is white, says the patient.
The dentist says, Hold still- I shouldn’t puncture your cheek.
I’m finding cavities on my body, says the patient.
The dentist says, Your molars look good, kid.
The mirror reflects my body dying, says the patient.
The dentist says, Your enamel is thick and hard.
Heaven sent you, yes? says the patient.
The dentist hands the man his sickle probe and says, Your turn.

Closeted

She suffers like a woman with flatulence in a crowded store
Who clenches her cheeks together, fakes unawareness
And keeps the gas inside
Until she shuffles to an empty aisle
Where she could fart next to stainless steel dinnerware
And nobody would know