Poems

The Twin I AbsorbedThe doctor found a toothinside the mass they removed from my abdomen—a fully formed adult molar,growing where no tooth should be. Then a second one, and a third,and something that resembled a fingernail,and tissue that under magnificationshowed the structure of a retina. A teratoma, the surgeon said.Your twin, absorbed in utero.Cells that […]

The Twelve Hour BBQ I set my alarm for four A.M. and didn’t need it,I was already awake at three because I’d seeded,the fire at midnight and checked it at two,the twelve hour BBQ requires what you do,which is stay close and manage and love the process through,the long dark of the pre-dawn and the

The Trade She Learned She learned the plumbing trade when women did not learn the plumbing trade,She took the apprenticeship and she was not afraid,She learned the pipe and the fitting and the pressure and the flow,She learned the code and passed the test and let the record show. The trade she learned when the

The Transaction GospelI trade my ethics like currency at the border crossing, smuggling righteousness for profit margins.Told myself the lie tastes better with money in my mouth, that compromise is just business by another name. I sold my principles to the highest bidder and called it pragmatism, called it survival.But the truth is I was

The Third Delivery The grease has turned to ice upon the first discarded boxI am a prisoner of the hunger and the double-turning locksI licked the cardboard clean and chewed the crusts of hardened wheatBut the furnace in my belly still demands more heavy meatI watched the driver vanish in the darkness of the streetLeaving

The Third Generation Shop His grandfather started it, his father kept it through the lean,And he inherited the building and the reputation clean,He did not coast on what the two before him built with care,He added to it and expanded what was there. The third generation shop on the corner of the old main road,The

The Thing I Was Going to Say I had it in the car—assembled, loaded, warm inside my mouthfrom the rehearsal, the whole architecture going southto north without a hedge or an apology or the managed version—I had the actual sentence with the actual immersionof the self behind it, the honest weight of it intact,the thing

The Thing Inside the Wall There’s a sound behind the plaster, low and wet and slow,Like something dragged its knuckles from the crawlspace down below,I pressed my ear against it in the hallway, two A.M.,And something pressed right back from the other side again. The inspector said it’s nothing, just the pipes contracting tight,But pipes

The Tallest Man Falls Hardest He built his walls from ambition and borrowed stone,Convinced the earth itself would yield to what he owned,He looked across the valley from his highest tower,And laughed at every warning like a man of power. The tallest man falls hardest when the ground gives way,He spent ten years ascending to

The Thanksgiving Table I set his place this year.Force of habit, muscle deep–the fork, the knife, the folded napkin,the water glass he used to keepat two beside his plate,always two, never twelve, never three,a man of geometric habitin the smallest ways that be. The turkey came out dry.He was the one who watched the bird,who