the last of the daylight cracked through the building sides one could tell it was after 5 pm the watermelon sized baby rats were out for their breakfast
she laid down to think of Jupiter her drug crooked back to the pavement scrawny bedazzled legs extended upward on the art building wall hieroglyphs of desperate youth her eyes scanned like Oklahoma driver’s radio then she noticed her left boot lost its heel the right boot had none to begin
sooty mullet waxy matted with environmental phlegm coughed out by bullshit talkers she looks toward the up and the moon tries to enter her nightly stage but as always held back by adoring tongue wagging angels watching for a ghetto bird sting
now stretched legs stiff uncrossed arms posed around her ribs she aches slightly the shallow in her breath helps to stave off those unaffordable desires that quickly become her monster jaws grinding she settles noticing a lone cluster of plastic hydrangeas bleached by the satellites looking down as a cherub babe
her soul comes and goes from door to door looking for a score body limbs head torso dirty flesh colored blanket 100th hand Betsey Johnson gym bag mildewed Wet n’ Wild goth girl pallet from 1985 somewhere between Hollywood and Union Station the overlay has lasted 20 years
the streets cacophony of laughter and cries lights scream to her good byes cop cars dog fights stabbings overdosed doves starvation American relief fleeing from here the NARCAN generation paper plate nutrition styrofoam hydration we recycle ourselves shallow is her breath brow sweats but no bread
inside hep C rots necessary functions ulcers void of burn no food no internal bleeding red cross she’s nailed to it the drums somewhere in Africa a cradle hands outlined in caves a body engulfed in darkness a mind she remembers remaining there
without knowing she’s there legs cramped stiff against the wall forever head reborn again sewer water baptized her eyes closed chest deep in its stillness head cocked to her right shoulder the angel of it won
words less spoken 