Buffalograss

Barely-morning pink curtains

drape an open window. Roaches scatter,

the letter t vibrating in cottonwoods.

His hair horsetail and snakeweed.

I siphon doubt from his throat

for the buffalograss.

Seep willow antler press against

the memory of the first man I saw naked.

His tongue a mosquito whispering

its name a hymn on mesquite,

my cheek. The things we see the other do

collapse words into yucca bone.

The Navajo word for eye

hardens into the word for war.