witchhunt

what did we ever do to you?

you were too heavy to cling to our coattails

too loud to hide beneath our skirts

too scared for solitude

cut loose and treading water

what did you expect from us?

you sullied us with scarlet letters

wasted our witchery like wine

slipped a joker into the deck

darkened every dawn

demanding that we sink

 

out of step

held to the bitumen

by the flimsy gravity

of false sanity and still

avoiding cracks in the pavement

train tracks keening with her memory

too cold and too hot and forever sticky

with effluvia

she calls she calls she calls

earwig intonations burrowing patiently 

towards the sick heart at my core

inclinations

yes i did

call the cops on him

yes i did

get them to drive me from his place to the station

yes i did

follow through on my plan of action

yes i did

step away from the discourse and exhale

no i won't 

listen to your lies now 

no i won't

stick around and play pretend

no i won't 

carry your narrative around my neck

no i won't 

be reduced to hysteria

by you and your team of trouble

 

hear the rains

lights off

shirts on

playing twenty questions

like only thirty somethings can

casting off 

catching on

to the hints dropped 

between beers and darts

he won two out of three

and left me smiling

lights on

shirts off

queer kin

my people are salt and fire
they feed me joy 
and ask for nothing in return
my people are raspberry mornings
the breathe truth
and keep my head above water
my people are red dirt and black feathers

mister aquarius (haiku)

cut my lip on silk
promises he never kept
bled out on roses

cold bones

remember rage raked through ribcages

wrecked by wanting

wounded by your wanton ways

waste me 

taste me

only to spit me out 

and grind me back

into gutters

stuttering

shuddering and shaking off the

callow curse of your caress

this flesh

is 

fallow