the dog, the dog, he’s at it again

in the space between splinter and fingernail,
she heard all the voices thickening in raw sap
hard,
chaffed,
stuffed into monochroma linens,
running down her sore throat, two stations later,
carefully wrapped in [reverse] static

she thought about the dried flowers caressing her insides, venomous, black winged anomalies all set in invisible frontiers of nitrogen oxides and cheap lavender seeds (not dangerous enough, ma’am, it's still growing) the last branches in her mind unstable and opaque as ravenous sights through a glossy window

she cried when it exploded
all over her small parts
and secret parts
her divine portrait carved in a rite
among the bones of enemies slain in battle

her cleaner skin, hair braided,
chopped lips as burned mahogany,
one swollen eye, one golden tooth

and all of the voices (one, three, five, twelve) wringing her in one place, one sacred place made out of rapid tongues, chanting priests dressed in robes of flowing reds leading a choir of spoken gore: “night will never come home, my darling, never again”

it felt wrong to know of this, father— all the buoyant violences behind close encounters, they would never touch her like they used to, at least not enough to make you forget the stench of burning corpses (purple skin, bluish bruises, dark meat, chop, chop, chop)

how lovely! to turn grass and mud in a handful of dried tears