From the Fishouse

Nothing

beat her

break her down or reek so
the way she do

nothing got her unzipped mind
her flypaper memory

she a riverbed will be
for a dog’s millennium

she gone lost
to her un-borns she pale smoke

shadow in the distance

she a train whistle’s whistle
this unworshipped this woman

she come like salt lick she go down
like a drowning man hollering for one last last

her story hung like seaweed
she come in she go out

like unworshipped women supposed to

knees bloody

knuckles got somebody’s

jawbone jammed on

hair coiled with September twatterlight
corkscrewed so tight even owls won’t hoot

until she pass by them longing, on long legs

lips the color of peril

bittersweet folded round a hollow in her twisted back

But her one good eye it flash—