My grandfather once told me our lives are like a dot, a dash, and a dot. ".__." typed or written to paper it looks kinda funny, but the meaning is much more somber. The first dot represents our birth, the dash represents our lives, the final period being the end of the line; death. My grandfather is nearing the final dot, that dumb dot that will take him away from us; steal him from his loving family that so desperately wishes his anecdotes, stories, toe popping, and tickle attacks would never end. But for some reason that dot doesn't care, it takes and it takes and it takes, with no regard to anyone or anything. This gluttonous dot doesn't care that those nearing his lair can feel it in their bones, that their loved ones can see the strain his pull exerts on their souls.

i.

my seventh-grade classmate slapped me with the back of her hand, inked in slurs

and i stood there and let the words become an iron brand on my cheek.

she spits into my food: “sorry to ruin your lunch—wouldn’t want to ruin the taste of dog.”

the words on my face burn hot. i don’t move to rub them away.

ii.

i bet your parents came to america to work in a california nail salon. i bet they probably cleaned my grandaddy’s toes.

actually, my mom arrived in ellis island, and she waved at lady liberty, and i bet she didn’t know that lady liberty’s a filthy snake and a liar

i bet your parents are proud that this great country even allowed them in

yeah, i bet they are. i bet it’s everything my dad imagined when he starved, drifting in the pacific and i bet he really liked being called a yellow gangster and i bet he felt real welcome when he wasn’t allowed in some restaurants and i bet it was way better than his family’s life being threatened by some men in red uniforms back home.

iii.

i wore a face mask in public last weekend and a man told me to bring the chinese disease back to where i came from. i wondered if i forgot to wash off “alien” from my forehead that morning

he spat on me, so i used his spit to rub his slurs off my cheek

he ended up breaking my nose, and i heard the noise of my bones snapping, and it sounded like: “chink, chink.”

iv.

well, i mean, america spits on people like me and 

america spits on people who don’t really behave all that right

and america kinda spits on everything that makes it scared but

i think you know that. i hope you know that.

but it’s just, selfishly, all i can think about is me, and that

america spat on me last weekend. and i don’t really think i liked it all that much.

When the Day

in Evening’s gown

with starlight sequins,

moonlight crowns

&

pours champagne,

counts ’20 down,

we close

the book

without

a

sound

The Milky Way,

Eve’s spiral sash,

crosses

her heart

&

chest

with ash,

each aster spoke

of remnants

flash —

the ember tales

of smoke

and gas

Moon

dons her mask:

jeweled,

pockmark eyes,

that shed

pearl teardrops

in disguise —

the roaring

twenty’s

truth

&

lies,

she, witness to

Earth’s

alibis

The clock

strikes nigh,

an empty page;

blood-stained hands

turn yesterday —

our love,

lost,

a (f)errous age

fraying fibers,

flesh,

handmade

We kiss

the end

of

hate

&

rage,

(the virus

by which

all betray)

embracing

’21’s

new days,

in gabardine,

Sun’s gold

we gaze

They said back at the beginning, either you come out of this knowing how to make a sourdough starter or you develop a drinking problem.

Ariana doesn’t particularly care for bread, or the solitude and desperation that might lead you to make it.

Instead, she finds herself in January 2021, making eggs for dinner. This happens to be the only skill she picked up during quarantine, and when paired with tortillas, happens to complement tequila quite nicely. The tortillas, she doesn’t remind herself, are not bread or homemade.

Ariana tries to crack an egg onto the edge of the pan but instead misses, and egg lands all over the top of the stove.

She laughs and it brings her roommate into the kitchen. Her laugh is not a happy laugh; it is bitter and tasteless, and she wonders if she’s crazy. She wonders if the last ten months have led her to insanity, or a lesser, sadder version of it. She wonders if any of this has occurred to her roommate, the only living soul to have seen her during this time of total seclusion, this slow descent leading to a stovetop mishap and graceless sarcasm.

“Are you okay?”

“Am I… okay?”

Ariana makes a hand gesture, the one where you make quotation marks with your fingers.

She doesn’t remember much after that, but she does remember the touch of her roommate as he tucked her in. Touch she hasn’t felt in months. Touch she doesn’t know how to respond to. What a feeling, to know it still exists.

“It will get easier.”

She still doesn’t know how to make that sourdough starter, but there’s still time.

I comb with needles of words

I float out with the breath of morning

Coffee

I sit up high on Empire State Building

Legs dangling

High heel pointed

Like a dagger

At passing

Ants

Freeing the wind as its tail is sunk

In mudgrass and I run,

Shoes disappearing as the

Earth turns

Square

This is before trees fall upon pages

And mute the birds

But the ground was never rooted

And the sky could

fall down

Die with liveliness

Rats with wings

Come back to consciousness

The young flower girl at her wedding

Burning with your coin cough

Water calling in the sirens as you blacked out

Bagboys murdered birds enough

For old trees to growl about

Seek out fragrant ashtrays

Cast fake blood on the snow

Pack poor women betrayed

By the letter O into jars of the bungalow

Dying bodies left in the rain haunt you to surrender

Yourself to start over

Antlers of war

Pose

Like fashion models

For brief camera clicks

Fighting for attention

Fighting for success

Skin leaving to bare

The beauty

Blood rolling out for their

Red-carpet entrance

Call it quits will you

Peace love & happiness

Just start talking

Make amends

Bow out humbly

As long as the gazes of people

And the snaps of cameras continue

Posing is still a running business

White sunlight casts upon closed lids

a fi'ry sunset glow,

as 'neath me fledgling grasses chill-

a paradox bestowed.

Ripe lilac breezes punctuate

the pressing troposphere,

plush purple wisps that twist and skate

through winter-ravaged nares.

Stout aster stems doth hold aloft

prismatic butterflies

with velvet tongues that seek the gloss

of nectar's sticky prize.

The plodding drone of laden bees

augments the brook's frore flux-

a limpid backyard symphony

'pon which my pith can sup.