milked the sea for its blood, it came out the color and consistency 

of college football and chaw. the last time was in the old growth 

forest, she had just married the exercise in futility, he drove an 

Aston Martin, ate steak with his hands. the spirits arrived in feathers 

and county fair raffle tickets, coaxing. the last time wasn’t the last time, 

but you kinda wish it was. the chosen one danced loose helixes in a 

flowy, sheer Swiss muslin cherry-blossom-colored caftan on a mostly 

dark stage lit only by the glowing voices of those that sang psalms. 

the baseball player’s walkout song was Saturn Devouring His Son and 

Selena, ‘Amor Prohibido.’ babies look like the old men dead set on 

getting selected for jury duty. giant salamanders the color of adolescent 

fire fled for shelter beneath the rotting logs. I know the girl who drove 

her F-150 through the wing place on Congress, I used to crash on her 

couch, she’d stroke my neck and my hair the nights I’d get sick beneath 

her porch. I’m just red velvet, porcupine, chugging along now, gaining 

mass and speed, I can feel it, almost now, can you feel it? almost now.