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For Lisa --
Black Ants And Fruit Flies

Have you ever seen black ants
on snow,
or a fruit fly
cast a shadow?

I don’t know --

When I was a boy
growing up on a farm
in Tejas, 
my brother Alberto and I
had an elaborate grave
for animals.
It was the Oh Fuck, I Up & Died Cemetery For Critters.
We had stones and wooden crosses 
with painted epitaphs: 
Here lies one leg of a prairie dog
ate by the damn chicken hawk
who’s been eating our chicks.
He was a good meal,
and in death he saved a hen.
God bless him;
or,
Here lies a one-eyed rodent
shot dead for being a rat;
or,
like when farmer Hopkins
poisoned my dog,
and my brother and I buried him
under a harvest moon.
The epitaph simply read,
He was our brother,
and we loved him.
Our hearts are broken ...

On cold winter nights,
I think of heaven, earth, and hell.

Tonight 
I think of when I e-mailed Glen,
told him she was dead;
but 
what I wanted to say was
I had talked to her 
and told her I liked her shit.
I told her I understood
the eating of her lover’s asshole; 
and, being we lived 10 miles from each other,
maybe one day we’d meet

-- but now,
she was gone;
and Glen e-mailed Jim, 
and Jim told our brothers and sisters
and we mourned.
Many pomes were written.
We told each other 
how beautiful these pieces were,

but

in reality, 
it all sucked --
like her death.

And

it still haunts me
-- Lake Michigan
-- words
-- her tongue.

On winter nights
I feel her cold lick,
and I pucker ;

but
I’d just like to say, 
“Lisa,
your pomes 
make me feel like Coyote.
Tricked by Raven, 
he fried and ate 
his own fucking anus
and
choked on it.
It’s goddamn funny --
isn’t it?”

Oh,
about black ants 
and snow;
fruit flies and shadows,

well,

I don’t know --

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