The Sea Is Farther Than Thought

In church, the boys have so much
light, plants grow towards them.
My aunt handed me an organdy
fan and said: Hold this if you’re frightened
or want to lose yourself—the devil
can dance like a goddamn dream.

There are three things on Earth
to point to: the sun, the moon, and
the television. I can locate one of these.
My brother walked into a garage
with a needle taped to a battery
and emerged with his stomach

tattooed. I don’t think I’ll touch a face
like that again. Across the street, wetbacks
sleep five to a room and sweep
and water their dirt, while children send
canoes without oars down the Hudson.
Let me explain Westward Expansion:

Snow unfolded over a wagon train
of nine and nothing without wings survived.
The sea is farther than thought. He answered
the door holding a rag to his neck
and we kissed on the service porch
near a pitbull that’d just won a fight.

Sometimes my father whittles
for my mother in front of a bonfire, the vein
searching his thigh, Corinthian-blue.
To be honest, I called because there was snow
in my glove, not because I missed you.
If the original tunnel of the body

is the mouth, I’ve never had one.
As a girl I kept suede horses
and a hairbrush inside a blond toy-box.
One day my face will refuse to turn away.
Some people like poison.
I kneeled every time I opened it.




From Tracing the Horse (BOA Editions, 2019). All rights reserved. Reprinted with the permission of the author.