sometimes my convictions are
not enough to soothe
the pain of the
weight of life so
i go into my
closet dig in my
cardboard box where i
keep the rosary i
found in the mud
behind one of the
homes i grew up
Recovery
absolution
water cold serene
then the holy light appears
rebirth i am pure
flagelación cerebral
me gusta caminar de noche
preferible sin la luna
esconderme en mis pensamientos
reír como niña como nunca pude
pensar en dulces y juegos
y olvidar todo lo que fui
flagelação cerebral
eu gosto de andar a noite
preferível sem a lua
esconda-se em meus pensamentos
ria como uma garota como eu nunca pude
pense em doces e jogos
e esquecer tudo o que eu era
cerebral flagellation
i like to walk at night
preferably without the moon
hide in my thoughts
laugh like a little girl like i never could
think of candy and games
and forget everything i was
my two dollar Bible
words sacred
the world
commits fratricide
for and
over you
since the
Breath released
the first
prokaryote upon
Tierra’s face
to serve
as a
guide and
as a
fate to
one and
all souls
you and
i are
one in
kind my
dearest treasure
paging Dr. Burroughs, Dr. Burroughs please…
WS i don’t feel that well tonight
the stars are covered in dust and grime
and the corner store doesn’t have the Windex i like
i’ve listen to Thelonius on Bluetooth
and Ravel’s Bolero till the landlady came
to shut me up it wasn’t even that loud
i struggle Billy Bull Baby i see you
in dreams of course with your suits and balding
beautiful head but your brain really turned me on
i’ve been going back and forth for three days whether i should
go to Daikokuya’s for a ramen bowl but i just don’t have the gumption
i think i’m depressed again the tears run like Jesse Owens and i have no interest in making
them stop
W im in head first in the Interzone of my own doing
for hours i sit on the kitchen counter
looking out for the little brown birds who eat the last
pomegranates of the winter and wonder where the
first half part of my life went but i worry more
that i have no specific certainty where my last half is
going
can you read me a bed time story my favorite is “Green Eggs
and Ham”
work by mbrazfield 2001
22 days
third
night
comes fast
bleeding has not
stopped but i wonder how
the little birds are doing outside its raining
the momma flutters about with pink worms impaled on her beak squirming one
last time as slowly as time is crawling my thoughts converse i imagine them eating cucumber sandwiches asking if worms breath
my bladder called mad as hell on account she needed to be emptied cold with wiggly knees i stood as if my life depended on it i smiled a little wishing i could care
twenty two days of my demons staring me down i imagined them wearing fine silk tunics sky blue laughing green eyes and if i could feel them they would feel like velvet i missed the lies but when they possessed me it was if i was being held by a mother tenderly and warm safely
away from the dark but one day my eyes opened and i saw that it wasn’t true none of it tired of my demons telling me what to do i stopped talking to them inviting them in the resentments i felt where stronger than the need for false love and security which they offered so well at first it was easy then it became hard then it was as if i just walked from one box car to another waiting for the entire train to go off the rails
pink paws
The walls spun around as the grains of steamed rice rolled off the table top like drops of mercury. Asian ladies watched in slow motion as thick moisture atop my brow trickled into a stream. My mouth parched and cottony could no longer pass air through my teeth to form words. I used my eyes to find contact, to cry for help. Nothing. Just stares. The breezes coming through to cool down the sweaty wanderers in the buzzing basement had now spun into typhoon winds crashing into my body.
Guatemalan gawkers and Salvy breast touchers hovered over my limp body laid out in crucifix formation on the concrete floor.
“Nina, nina, are you okay?” said one Oaxacan with a blinking Bluetooth on his left ear.
From where my head laid, I could see the plastic bags filled with pea green plantains, shrimp and Jose Cuervo. One woman with thick legs and a large camel toe bent over me, almost in a bowing formation. I thought I was saved.
“Rafa, Rafa, coll de fire meinz, andale!!” She belted out as she turned her great ass toward my face and the light went out.
No one read minds. Had someone known that my chest was imploding and my soul hovered above me playing poker with John Fante, they would have called for help much sooner.
Berakah to Broadway
my favorite hour is at 3:07 a.m. your ramblers are spent. the streets are hot with discontent and happiness. your building walls are tired. there is hope and despair. the lights flicker off and off and sometimes on. dear Broadway i love you so. i want to drop dead on your asphalt and sink in forever. your silent strength feeding and nourishing all staggers of life. days are lived fast upon you. the letters, the pictures, the breaths, the gasps; cultivator of all that. your façade oozing with corporate swag, but your soul, your spirit profound, pure, wild and capricious, like a beautiful woman. i want to roll in your soot, trip on your cracks and see your ghosts who lived in you and of you, my beloved Broadway. speak easy of my dreams, mistress keeper of my veins in your dark little alleys. i love you so Broadway. i want you all to myself, no man, woman or creature can have you. you are my mother, when no one is willing to be. you are my father when all are too cowardly. you gave me karate movies, 8-tracks and joy. you gave me advice, caution and wisdom. you are my mistress, chancellor of my education and intuitions. you are my eyes into the past that lingers in my most penultimate remembrances as a child falling down by your fire hydrant. to you, who has always been the only one who understands my twistedness and carcinomatous fevers, i write to you fair goddess, keeper of myself. i love you so my beloved Broadway. thank you for keeping me in your implorations.
