Pasha Satara

fecal city, do you cradle a corpse
somewhere in your sewer depths? you might hold
the bones of one who loved & played for me.
...

you believed in the velvet sky
& i, i believed in you

so if somewhere there's a crush
...

Oh, baby,
you're somewhere on the road
with the windows open wide to the cold,
in a pickup truck
...

Ai, Lorca,
when the moon is sweating on the bed
I will borrow hard
the cry of sand and footsteps
...

(Sins of the father; love for the daughter)

It is on days like these,
when the grass lays wet on the side of the hill,
...

We are on our last leg, limping.
Nobody smiles and it would take a step ladder
to see into your eyes.
We've trades hearts for spades
...

And did I hate him then,
not knowing where his hammy fists
sank muffled shots into my mother,
not knowing that she feared his homecomings
...

In wing-tipped shoes, my father danced
on the black keys of a stained piano
like a drunken exhibitionist,
chasing shadows like the crows
...

...

Lori, I tell you
it's like a lit cigarette in the dark...
it'll burn out.
Ashes to ashes
...

this is it, a series
of endings, a series of doors
closing & locking from behind
closing & locking from behind
...

Light yr cigarettes as fast as you can
& always keep the flame inside yr hand

Keep yr gun barrels dull
...

he was a wooden bead
he said his wounds were war-inflicted
vietnam vet
three tours of duty
...

it's a cheap reconcilation -
you come knock at my door,
sit on my sofa,
drink my tea, & i knew you once...
...

In mid-October, the house flies invaded my shanty, tiny flat. First one, then two, three, then the small ones, like babies. They flew about. They grew. They walked on dog feces from the puppies and then crawled up and down my arms and legs.

I bought an old-fashioned fly swatter—but why is it called a 'swatter' when it is so obviously a death weapon?
...

(for Xpistos before I knew he was Xpistos)

two smokes sitting in the living room
after a long day,
...

there is something fierce
about feeling like the wing
of a butterfly,
not a dangerous fierce,
...

(for HG, Sr., who taught me to be a child)

old man forever young
frail w/lungs filling w/fluid,
...

when you think 'more'
& you take a 'tally'
can you combine yrself
into a mortal
...

& it all goes in cycles, the way we're born, the way we live, the way we die. i've been the flower child & the woman holding the flowers at my grandfather's grave, ready to jump in with him & let the soil cover us. not letting go is a habit of mine. like wanting control & chocolate & another chance. yes, he calls me his strange angel & i cannot disagree, but i prefer unique, eclectic, accelerated, streaked w/conscience & perhaps a resemblance to musical riffs hidden in the walls. & roxy, i swear, i do hear the caged bird sing, even when the cat anais black turns away hungry. i listen for the chimes & the drumbeats of other lands, pound ancient flamenco in dirty bare feet on his dirty bare floor, patterning the rhythm of his guitar. i fall into his eyes long before his fingers awaken from their journey. we walked in the orchard in the rain, made love under the blossoming peach trees, bathed one another in the porcelain claw foot tub at the top of the stairs, & slept on clean cotton sheets older than bone memory.

he put the desire album on the turntable, came up behind me, held me backwards as we swayed together close to an epiphany, while the breeze came in through his sheer white curtains like pledges on our skin. yet we know vows sour. we understand that words are simply combinations of a 26-letter alphabet that are merely symbols. we become incomprehensible. we don’t take or give oaths anymore, having seen shattered glass and bleeding ears from the fallout.
...