CATALOGUE OF TEARING

   dewy decimal isn’t a system

    of organization but a unit

         of water open the library

              in refractions ribs you a cage

              flight of cormorants      Brittle

             that summer I met you    by brittle    

          publication date: 2013    a hard vowel    

       a hard life       ask me a question

       what is the stinkiest chemical

                                 what kind of crying

            are you looking for

        welcome  condensed catacomb

     on this floor the spines are soft

 a visitor cranks each movable shelf

sink forks to bilge-bottom locate each

   feathery karyotype  careful not to crush

               each sweet ROM 

1-STAR MOTEL IN YR SAN JUNIPERO HEART

X’s a Japanophile & Canucks fan.
      Being his second (third?) Chinese something
              or other was like picking chewed-up bones

with yr teeth—a close-up scene of sea soup
      we slurped from inside a trench kitchen. Man,
              I still love that guy though. Every friend’s all,

“You dodged a bullet made of normie/weeb.”

        But I’m like. Let me have this one. Nothing
              is quite the same as your early twenties:

we drank milkshake & didn’t hold hands. Phones

        connect our spooled blood vessels—DMs keep
              our fingers tied like rubber promise rings

we wouldn’t wear. Train passes Hangzhou. Plenty

        of times I would lie there, synapse a loop
              of if only. I jumped into men’s beds

to survive. I could tell him now. Thank you

        for this temporary home. Why I’m not
              mad, why I won’t excavate meaning from

our clumsy reticent bodies is cuz

        “What does this remind you of?” is boring.
            I’ll psychoanalyze myself later.

After poking him with my hairclip (knot

        after knot of tomorrow in our heads),
              I blocked him on FB but not on Skype. 

Tomorrow is an impulsive fog. Clones

        of bad men were everywhere. So were sneers
            behind each queer shhh, you’re safe with me.

               X wasn’t bad. X will forever be

               my sweet bare minimum against whom all

         others will be judged. Wait, hold on. Will you

               hold me like he once did. Will you hold me

               like lovers in San Junipero. Fall

             sizzled, sighed. My elephant feet crater

               heart stomped out recollections of mirrors,

               twisting our faces into denying

             their stinkbug jarred fates. Won’t let you wipe

               my crater-crow umbrella feet dry. Dupe

               me into staying until the years fuzz

             & fade. I know it’s not twenty

               sixteen anymore. A fusion of gems

               is all I want to curl myself inside.

             Let this become an experience you

               can’t market as blankets. I wade beside

               you inside an overflowing Cháng Thames,

             a dam of seconds but not second best.

               Inside this one-heart motel of autumn

               stars are raptors of mourning. Kept the rest

             of these memories a secret. Help me

               conceal parts that healed her shrapnel wounds. Sing

               the OST until you believe in

              yourself again. Silly, we’re not alone. 

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