City blue
what skin grows in that basement meat-
locker, our hands numb & bloodied,
skin in flaps from swollen knuckles:
& outside summer blooms in blue light
before dark settles purple-throated,
like we choked it—
warm & stung, we walk together
matching shiners, eye-shine
like hunting dogs when tower-lights
wreathe & catch us—
we know, you & I,
what grows in cold subterranean fields,
what opens to air in heaven shadow
sliced up between sun &
dark & overhead a moon rounded,
blue-faced, waiting for river-tides
to crest before breathing:
we wrap our hands & in the blue shadows
no one looks at us for very long.
Fishtown
i
mural queen of palmer street
waits out weeknights for latecomers
huffing home high
on bike-tire fumes & acrylic paint
& to make her believe this city
bleeds real still & green she scratches
raw glass-studded lots
unearthing brick & painted bones
with red under-stained fingernails.
& that expressway son of east girard
still marks out time in sparks & roars
from flaming combustion-
engine hearts: boys still race in lip-red cars
taste broke-teethed blood & brass
& bile: he doesn’t need
those cathedral songs reminding him
of all he did when this city & him were just goddamn kids.
ii
millennium weddings
in half-drowned cafes;
catered by veterans from the
bad-old-days & guests line
corporate chemical miles
for the king & the queen
to tear up gentrifiers, rend
through the ease & the rage & the lie.
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