Paloma

15

The 2 A.M. train
is a glowing sweat transaction
the flexing conductor arm like a phantom limb
his fist a moist and slick organ
pumping out lonely caterwaul cries

my back is wet and humming with mosquitos
they flicker against my bulbous head
the grain of my cheeks
this flax skin of fumbled melanin

these eyes are frescoed search lights
the dry yolk of them gliding with static awakeness
in the skull of 4 A.M. when
the garden is crowded with crysoprase cicadas
their clicks like pilgrimage points to the
dead husk of my ear

catching seeds on my tongue I
swallow a white powder prayer
in the muddy light of 6 A.M.
when the steel tracks are still humming in
their aggravation

Texas summers are measured by
ant bites on ankles and
the crosses we dig into them each night with our nails when
we wedge the holy spirit under our
mounds of red skin

These days congeal like
river-bank algae beneath
a liquid sky
the shocked blue of a heat flash
of a fist against metal
of wailing air at dusk