To/For the Screaming Child

It would have to be blue but I (also)

want a ball not because it aches but because

my lips primarily biolumenesce blue

my most native tongue not-involves

the throat is silent and colored

even when hunched over the desk

my lips pretending to belong to

a very respected detective I wasn't

thinking about them even a little

but they were glowing blue

without me I realize I am always detecting

It is how I make it but it's so much

I say to the cows please turn off

my brain and I imagine a key hole

in my temple but never the key

but the cows aren't like me i am comfortable

when they don't blink hardly

ever and they do not know what

I taste like

Screaming child, I am sorry

in my train I forgot you and

the ball that you are screaming for

What can I say that sounds grownup and

wise don't stop screaming? never stop

desiring so loudly they press their

face into hot bricksides to hear

your safe commotion

and as for the round objects

to throw and catch-- do not believe them:

the air is changed despite what they

will say again I know you are probably

not interested anymore I know you want

that ball so badly and that is probably best

For Adrienne

The dog smelling sour in her hair: the only creature who presses against me
this hour I learned you no longer breathe. In my mother's house my mother's
words in response: cruel: echo.

I wanted a dog as a child. Instead l listened to Kurk Cobain and the bird bit
my finger from his cage: green if I had to name it. Years ahead I am naked
in a young tub when I learn of your death on Facebook: could you imagine

it would be like this. Your eyes are burning

with Jupiter now: I see you clearer than ever:
not your hands that shook but your voice that did not

the one time I met you in a dress you complimented and I felt like a disgrace. What does it matter

I did not scream at the forest this night I learned.
Lucille welcomes you, pray, Adrienne, around the fire I am sure
you both are dancing. The cat brushing against my back
in the same endless moment: the crickets wake

where I am,

my name does not appear in the atlas next
to yours rising in braille. I would dive into the ocean
if there were one because I am reading the bottom with my finger

tips. How connected in our separateness we are. If dogs howled

now my own howl could be lost inside the collective: safe there I am

more wild than this. And you. You are free.