I died in September
cried myself to sleep and drown in a river of
blood
is this what hell looks like?
sad silent haunting

red

it took me two months to swallow the river
(product of my sorrow)

I went home Thanksgiving a new man
and daddy asks
“why do you dress like a vampire?”

he’s on to me

the next twenty days I fantasized revenge
I read I practiced
I wrote:
“How to Swallow a Man After He’s Broken Your Heart”

I died in the process

I went home Christmas a dead man full
and daddy asks
“whose funeral you going to?”

mine

I buried my body at the bottom of my stomach
killed the butterflies
swallowed a photograph of the self I were
planted flowers in my liver
and poured 40s atop my casket till my stomach
bleed

I tried to write a eulogy on the spot:

fantasy of revolution cause my nose
bleed    Abandonment cause my wrist
bleed    Empathy cause my heart
bleed    Ambition cause my nail
bleed

anxiety tell body to turn bread and water to
blood my stool

red   my eyes
red    my hands
red    my knees
red    too

had I not seen so much I'd say my blood be

black
black as my wardrobe
black as me
black as my darkest day and
black as my daddy be

it would be a lie    to say my blood not
red   as the letter on my chest
red   as the devil’s tongue down my grandmother’s spine
red    as    black boys out
  of time

do you believe in God?
do they look     like you?
are their hands
red   like yours?       and if Jesus be man
   were his sin vibrant as yours?

daddy called on Easter and asks
“where are you?”

resurrecting

I dream of blood showers come
night and I rise to nightmare turned reality

a mouth full of iron
a stomach full of men
a heart full
of nothing

in a room warm and comfortable as hell my body pours
red
as I watch what little love be disintegrate from today
evaporate into the past
present in no one's but mine

my heart broken again
and my fatal thirst return