Would It Kill Me to Be a Nicer Guy?

Insomniac for a high noon
called midnight. Another howling
Coyote ass chorus of disapproval—Malinche          
was my Farrah Fawcett poster          

no strap
              no thong

no tongue
              just hair

masculine taped to     my bedroom wall

an imagined papacito
in a big bad brown
teen lobo
den for real.

The gigalo furrowed browed
spittled jowls highlights yellow        

an estrangement with my pack
of sancho sinvergüenzas

swimming in lack
for Mommy Malinchismo

But we appreciate over time,
our bellies get full over time.
And     these papers     overwhelm an archive.

So for a good time call Cortez, a casual encounter. 
No strings attached
             cuando estoy triste I swipe right.

Credit

Copyright © 2020 by Raquel Gutiérrez. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on December 2, 2020, by the Academy of American Poets.

About this Poem

“Many poems in my manuscript are inspired by the story of José Olivares, a young laborer in 1870s Tucson, who was caught in a lover’s triangle and murdered by a hacendado for romancing the powerful landowner’s wife. I’m interested in the ways class intersects with desire and how both help contour the borderlands’ histories of colonization and racial capitalism.”
—Raquel Gutiérrez