made a flag from the
bones
of dead soldiers,
built a nation from
the skins of the
natives
raped children in
full sight of god
in houses of prayer
in houses of shame
where the
water ran black
where the dogs ate
what the
priests puked up
and we hid in
alleyways
and we started fires
where the
homeless slept
we were the bitter
hands of jesus
we had come to stone
his lover
she said pain was
better
than feeling nothing
at all
like blue skies over rows of
split-level houses like
lush well-kept lawns
like driving lost down
anonymous suburban streets
says sunlight is all he has to
give you and so
you take it for your own
says the bridge only goes
half way across the river
reminds me of my
grandfather’s suicide of the pale
luminous skin of the only woman i
never stopped loving
feels like war
which is what we always say in
this age of neverending
atrocities
a million children
starve to death just so you
can grow up fat
a job digging unmarked
graves is still a job
dream of warm saturday
afternoons and the sound of
church bells
wake up to the
smell of gasoline
and god is neither lost nor
found and christ was only ever
one more frightened junkie
woman i know tells me she
can’t see me anymore but says
i’m still in her prayers and i
have no answer for this
but laughter
i keep driving
up and down silent
sunwashed streets hoping to
recognize one of these houses
as my own
i keep waiting for the
moment of truth to end
find my father’s bones in
the desert, but not his wings
take the diamonds from his eyes
this is what i remember
from the last century, and so
this is the basis for
all of my lies
i don’t want to hear about his
death in a hospital bed, and
i don’t want to hear about
the motherfucking future
the plan is to tie up
her parents
the plan is to take the child
from its home then drive
down to mexico and kill it,
and i remember laughing
the plan falls apart, but not
before the oldest
daughter has been raped
and listen
there is no plan, of course,
only a silence that needs
to be filled with
meaningless words
there is only money and
less money and no money
my father’s bones in the
desert, worth less than the
small cost of burying them
slow bleeding in a cold room and
he’s the same age as you
he’s a father and a son and
a believer in the age of miracles but
the age of miracles is gone
the west coast is a fading dream
all those saints and angels waiting
for the last house to fall or
the needle to hit bone
all those death row inmates
laughing at
the idea of salvation
tell her you don’t believe in murder but
what about all of those
people you’d love to see dead?
think about the ocean
as it begins to rain
two half-truths are a start but
the map still needs a key
the desert means something
different to each of us
tell him this and he turns away
a clock on every wall and they
all give different times
it’s like some definition of
god that finally makes sense
Because
I am a motherfucker of
many
words, my review can
be
found here:
