lungfish

i’m red.

i’m cement shoes, the seaside.
i’m dirty; a matchstick or a dildo,
the thrum of a hammerheart, a stolen tv.

give me miles in the mojave desert
for i’m the jut of my hips and little else.
but worth speculation is the itch in my eyes,
the dead cats in the freezer,
bulletholes and pores through which whole lives have spoken.

and i’m not scars, but from down here in the hole
i can tell you i’m acclimated with drowning.
and i’m not bodies, most definitely not my own
which i know for sure belongs to anyone else.
so throw me a bone, throw me a pity party,
but if you tell me you’re sorry your ass is grass.

put me on a bender, peel my fingernails
with a potato skinner. suck out the insides.
string me up by the nipples of my soul
down by the hudson river where an old friend drowned.

i no longer live by that river. things are not as they were.
they gave me peace of mind, and sutured my fins,
and left me to the land. i left the land
to cement shoes and the seaside.

and though i may have left with no goodbyes,
i left with no regrets.
and though i may have left the water running,
i left with my lungs intact.

it’s a far cry, but i know
you hear me: i’m the one
who will not come home.