You and your friend stood 

on the corner of the liquor store

as I left Champa Garden, 

takeout in hand, on the phone 

with Ashley who said, 

That was your tough voice.

I never heard your tough voice before. 

I gave you boys a quick nod, 

walked E 21st past dark houses. 

Before I could reach the lights 

on Park, you criss-crossed 

your hands around me,

like a friend and I’d hoped 

that you were Seng, 

the boy I’d kissed on First Friday 

in October. He paid for my lunch 

at that restaurant, split the leftovers. 

But that was a long time ago 

and we hadn’t spoken since, 

so I dropped to my knees 

to loosen myself from your grip, 

my back to the ground, I kicked 

and screamed but nobody 

in the neighborhood heard me, 

only Ashley on the other line, 

in Birmingham, where they say 

How are you? to strangers 

not what I said in my tough voice

but what I last texted Seng, 

no response. You didn’t get on top, 

you hovered. My elbows banged 

the sidewalk. I threw 

the takeout at you and saw 

your face. Young. More scared 

of me than I was of you. 

Hands on my ankles, I thought 

you’d take me or rape me. 

Instead you acted like a man 

who slipped out of my bed

and promised to call: 

You said nothing. 

Not even what you wanted.

It was at first fire

Then volcanoes 

Now the latest fear keeping 

My daughter’s door open

Through the night

Is that of being afraid

Is there a narrator in this show 

She asks as the authority  

Of the voiceover in the cartoon

Loses what I imagine as credibility 

In her six-year-old mind

It’s a creation myth

The one she’s watching

Because it was intentional 

For months before her conception 

I was afraid of having sex

As though there’s an answer 

That would eclipse this 

New-found complication

How can I not be scared 

Of being scared she asks

Never trust the authority 

Of the narrator I want 

To tell her but I’d be lying

Maybe a bit dramatic, but I light

candles with my breakfast, wear a white gown 

around the house like a virgin. Right

or wrong, forgive me? No one in this town 

knows forgiveness. Miles from the limits

if I squint, there’s Orion. If heaven

exists I will be there in a minute

to hop the pearly gates, a ghost felon,

to find him. Of blood, of mud, of wise men. 

But who am I now after all these years 

without him: boy widow barbarian

trapping hornets in my shit grin. He’ll fear 

who I’ve been since. He’ll see I’m a liar,

a cheater, a whole garden on fire.

Here's my head, in a dank corner of the yard.
I lied it off and so off it rolled.
It wasn't unbelieving that caused it
to drop off my neck and loll down a slope.
Perhaps it had a mind of its own, wanted
to leave me for a little while.

Or it was scared and detached itself
from the stalk of my neck as a lizard's tail
will desert its body in fright of being caught.
The fact is, I never lied. The fact is,
I always lied. Before us, we have two mirrors.
At times, they say, one must lie in order

to survive. I drove by the house, passed
it several times, pretending it was not
my own. Its windows were red with curtains
and the honeyed light cast on the porch
did not succeed in luring me back inside.
I never lied. I drove by the house,

suckling the thought of other lovers
like a lozenge. I was pale as a papery birch.
I was pure as a brand new pair of underwear.
It will be a long while before I touch another.
Yet, I always lied, an oil slick on my tongue.
I used to think that I was wrong, could

not tell the truth for what it was. Yet, one
cannot take a lawsuit out on oneself.
I would have sworn in court that I believed
myself and then felt guilty a long time after.
I hated the house and I hated myself.
The house fattened with books, made me

grow to hate books, when all the while
it was only books that never claimed
to tell the truth. I hated him and I hated
his room, within which his cloud of smoke
heaved. I disappeared up narrow stairs,
slipped quick beneath the covers.

My stomach hurts, I told him, I was tired.
I grew my dreams thick through hot nights:
dear, flickering flowers. They had eyes
which stared, and I found I could not afford
their nurture, could not return their stare,
Meanwhile, liars began their parade

without my asking, strode sidewalks inches
before my doorstep. I watched their hulking
and strange beauty, their songs pregnant
with freedom, and became an other self.
I taught children how to curse.
I bought children gold pints of liquor.

I sold my mind on the street.
1 learned another language. It translates easily.
Here's how: What I say is not what I mean,
nor is it ever what I meant to say.
You must not believe me when I say
there's nothing left to love in this world.